Category Archives: April Fools day

April 1

It’s that time of year again when you have to analyze anything you hear or see (as if you shouldn’t always do that) because it could just be a prank or a joke.

But where did it all start this fooling of people on April First?

Some historians speculate that April Fools’ Day dates back to 1582, when France switched from the Julian calendar to the Gregorian calendar, as called for by the Council of Trent in 1563. In the Julian Calendar, as in the Hindu calendar, the new year began with the spring equinox around April 1.

People who were slow to get the news or failed to recognize that the start of the new year had moved to January 1 and continued to celebrate it during the last week of March through April 1 became the butt of jokes and hoaxes and were called “April fools.” These pranks included having paper fish placed on their backs and being referred to as “poisson d’avril” (April fish), said to symbolize a young, easily caught fish and a gullible person.

In 1686, John Aubrey referred to the celebration as “Fooles holy day”, the first British reference.[8] On 1 April 1698, several people were tricked into going to the Tower of London to “see the Lions washed”.

Although no biblical scholar or historian is known to have mentioned a relationship, some have expressed the belief that the origins of April Fools’ Day may go back to the Genesis flood narrative. In a 1908 edition of Harper’s Weekly cartoonist Bertha R. McDonald wrote:

Authorities gravely back with it to the time of Noah and the ark. The London Public Advertiser of March 13, 1769, printed: “The mistake of Noah sending the dove out of the ark before the water had abated, on the first day of April, and to perpetuate the memory of this deliverance it was thought proper, whoever forgot so remarkable a circumstance, to punish them by sending them upon some sleeveless errand similar to that ineffectual message upon which the bird was sent by the patriarch”

In modern times, people have gone to great lengths to create elaborate April Fools’ Day hoaxes. Newspapers, radio and TV stations and websites have participated in the April 1 tradition of reporting outrageous fictional claims that have fooled their audiences.

The BBC television programme Panorama ran a hoax in 1957, purporting to show the Swiss harvesting spaghetti from trees. They claimed that the despised pest, the spaghetti weevil, had been eradicated. A large number of people contacted the BBC wanting to know how to cultivate their spaghetti trees. It was, in fact, partially filmed in St Albans. The editor of Panorama at the time, Michael Peacock, approved the idea, which was pitched by freelance camera operator Charles de Jaeger. Peacock told the BBC in 2014 that he gave de Jaeger a budget of £100. Peacock said the respected Panorama anchorman Richard Dimbleby knew they were using his authoritativeness to make the joke work. He said Dimbleby loved the idea and went at it with relish. Decades later CNN called this broadcast “the biggest hoax that any reputable news establishment ever pulled”.

In 2021 Volkswagen USA announced they were rebranding to Voltswagen. This prank backfired because the prank was believed and it pushed up the share price, prompting an investigation by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

In 1969, the public broadcaster NTS in the Netherlands announced that inspectors with remote scanners would drive the streets to detect people who had not paid their radio/TV tax The only way to prevent detection was to wrap the TV/radio in aluminium foil. The next day all supermarkets were sold out of their aluminium foil, and a surge of TV/radio taxes was being paid.

The German newspaper Berliner Tageblatt reported in 1905 that thieves had tunnelled beneath the U.S. Federal Treasury and stolen all its silver and gold.

Billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk has released a rap song. Briefly stepping away from his work in space exploration and pioneering transport systems, the American released a track called “RIP Harambe” – a reference to the Cincinnati Zoo gorilla which was shot after a small boy fell into its enclosure in 2016. Although this had all the hallmarks of an April Fools’ day prank, it wasn’t. Elon Musk did record RIP Harambe.

sources

https://www.history.com/topics/holidays/april-fools-day

https://www.cbsnews.com/media/15-best-april-fools-day-hoaxes/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_April_Fools%27_Day_jokes

Be on your guard- It is April 1, don’t be fooled

How did become the first day of the 4th month, aka April 1, the day of trying to fool people or to play pranks on them. Since I come from a long line of pranksters and it appears it has transferred into the newest generations of the family, I always have a slight sense of paranoia on this day. They are all out to get me.

The origin of April Fools’ day seems to be a bit vague. Some say that it started in 1582, when France changed from the Julian calendar to the Gregorian calendar. The switch took place because France has decided to commence their New Year with the Spring Equinox, which takes place around April 1, not all of France’s citizens accepted this change and were therefore called April Fools.

Another theory is that April 1st became the fool’s holiday due to Geoffrey Chaucer’s 14th century collection, The Canterbury Tales, wherein Chaucer includes a playful reference to “32 March,” or April 1st. However, most scholars consider it to have been a mere copying error.

In my native ,the Netherlands, the origin of April Fools’ Day is often attributed to the Dutch victory in 1572 at Brielle, where the Spanish Duke Álvarez de Toledo was defeated.”Op 1 april verloor Alva zijn bril is a Dutch proverb, which can be translated as: “On the first of April, Alva lost his glasses.” In this case, “bril” (“glasses” in Dutch) serves as a homonym for Brielle. This theory, however, provides no explanation for the international celebration of April Fools’ Day.

Some even suggested that the tradition goes back to biblical times. Some scholars say it goes back as far as to the flood in Noah’s time as described in Genesis chapters 6–9.

The London Public Advertiser of March 13, 1769, printed: “The mistake of Noah sending the dove out of the ark before the water had abated, on the first day of April, and to perpetuate the memory of this deliverance it was thought proper, whoever forgot so remarkable a circumstance, to punish them by sending them upon some sleeveless errand similar to that ineffectual message upon which the bird was sent by the patriarch”

Over the centuries people have come up with some many different ways to fool their fellow men.

On April Fools’ Day 1957 by the BBC current-affairs program Panorama, purportedly showing a family in southern Switzerland harvesting spaghetti from the family “spaghetti tree”. At the time spaghetti was relatively unknown in the UK, so many British people were unaware that it is made from wheat flour and water; a number of viewers afterwards contacted the BBC for advice on growing their own spaghetti trees.

In 1962, Swedish national television broadcast a 5-minute special on how one could get color TV by placing a nylon stocking in front of the TV. A rather in-depth description on the physics behind the phenomenon was included. Thousands of people tried it.

In 2016, one of the biggest pornography sharing sites Pornhub changed its name to Cornhub and displayed suggestive videos featuring corn. The site used a similar prank for 2018’s April Fools Day – this time changing its name to Hornhub and displaying videos about women blowing horns instead of pornography.

I wish you all a good April Fools’ day and I hope that you will have lots of laughs.

Donation

I am passionate about my site and I know you all like reading my blogs. I have been doing this at no cost and will continue to do so. All I ask is for a voluntary donation of $2 ,however if you are not in a position to do so I can fully understand, maybe next time then. Thanks To donate click on the credit/debit card icon of the card you will use. If you want to donate more then $2 just add a higher number in the box left from the paypal link. Many thanks

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sources

https://english.jagran.com/lifestyle/april-fools-day-2021-why-april-1-is-celebrated-as-fools-day-know-history-and-significance-of-years-funniest-day-10025082

https://www.dictionary.com/e/fool/

http://hoaxes.org/archive/permalink/instant_color_tv

https://www.complex.com/life/2016/04/pornhub-april-fools-prank-corn-hub

https://www.ladbible.com/community/viral-awesome-pornhub-offering-very-different-videos-after-changing-name-to-hornhub-20180401

April Fool’s Day in WWII

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Although the world was going through one of the darkest era’s in its existence , there was still a sense of humour prevailing. For many it was this sense of humour which was all that remained of their humanity.

Below are some examples of April Fool#s day hoaxes during WWII.

On April 1 1943

The Kingsport Times (of Kingsport, Tennessee) ran a photo on its front page of what it said was Field Marshal Erwin Rommel’s “escape ship,” spotted going down the local Holston River. It said the ship had entered the Holston River by way of the Gulf of Mexico.1943rommel_lg

“ROMMEL RUNS UP REEDY CREEK — In the absence of the Tennessee State Guard from Kingsport due to training at Camp Forrest, a hurry-up call was placed today for the Piney Flats Regulars and the Bays Mountain Reserves to rush to Kingsport to prevent Field Marshal Rommel’s escape ship, seen here going down the Holston River, from using Reedy Creek as an “escape corridor.” The escape ship from Tunisia was reported to have entered the Holston River by way of the Gulf of Mexico. Now turn the paper upside down for the rest of the story.

(upside-down text:)
We’re sorry, it wasn’t Reedy Creek after all. It was salt river — and we ain’t fooling on that last — even though it is April Fool Day.”

 

1942kingsport_lg_thumb_153_195

Here is what the Kingsport Times’ photographer, Ronnie Ezell, claims is the prize picture of the year (well, day anyway). He says this plane sliced the steeple at the First Presbyterian Church and despite the condition of the airplane’s wing fluttered off in the direction of Gate City. (Or maybe the photographer said he was the one who had just fluttered in from Gate City.)” [Kingsport Times (Tennessee) – Apr 1, 1942]

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“Fun-loving Americans spend about $8,000,000 a year on tricky gadgets which make good fun on April Fool’s Day. Here are a few you should watch out for this year: Plate Lifter — Your blueplate gets a bouncing wanderlust; Hot Salt — It comes out pepper; Inseparable Saucer — Sticks to cup; Tough Doughnut — A rubber sinker; Dribble Glass — April showers.” [AP Features April 1 1944]

1945visie_talkie01

Radio-Craft magazine, in an article credited to Grego Banshuk, announced what it declared was “the biggest development in television up to now” — the Visie-Talkie. It was a portable television handset. In other words, a handheld videophone.

Banshuk explained that the device had been made possible by the invention of “non-scanning television” technology, which involved “thousands of fine wires… bunched very close together.”

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I am passionate about my site and I know you all like reading my blogs. I have been doing this at no cost and will continue to do so. All I ask is for a voluntary donation of $2, however if you are not in a position to do so I can fully understand, maybe next time then. Thank you. To donate click on the credit/debit card icon of the card you will use. If you want to donate more then $2 just add a higher number in the box left from the PayPal link. Many thanks.

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Source

Museum of Hoaxes

April Fools day pranks during WWII

 

Calendar of Fools dayAlthough the world was going through one of the darkest era’s in its existence , there was still a sense of humour prevailing. For many it was this sense of humour which was all that remained of their humanity.

Black Bombers    (April Fool’s Day – 1941)

1941bombers_lg

The Elkhart Daily Truth detailed a plan to create a protective air fleet for Indiana at low cost by attaching miniature, eight-ounce bombs to 25,000 crows, which would be trained to release the bombs on the enemy. The report included a photograph of one of the “Black Bombers.” The “bomb” in the picture was really a salt shaker, and the crow was stuffed.

Although the crow bombers were an April Fool’s day joke, there really was a plan developed and tested by the U.S. military during World War II to create “bat bombs” by strapping incendiary devices to bats, and then dropping the bats on Japanese cities.

batbomb

Rue Maurice Thorez    (April Fool’s Day – 1941)

1941thorez

The Vichy government in France arrested 13 people on the charge of participating in a “Communist April Fool day plot” to rename streets in Marseille after the exiled Communist leader Maurice Thorez.

800px-USSR_stamp_M.Thorez_1965_6k

The police made the arrests after finding a large quantity of signs reading “Maurice Thorez Street” (or “Rue Maurice Thorez”) designed to be placed over the regular street signs in the city.

April Fool Fun Rationed    (April Fool’s Day – 1943)

1943rationed

The Associated Press reported that the Society for the Preservation of Practical Jokers had issued an advisory to its members warning them that “in view of the war’s restrictions on what some fools consider fun” practical jokers should proceed with caution “otherwise, there might be casualties.”

“Don’t put any bricks under old hats on the sidewalk, for passing pedestrians to kick. It’s sabotage— shoes are rationed.

Don’t use that old wallet-on-a-string trick. If the sucker bends over to pick it up, he may bust his suspenders. Rubber elastic is scarce.

Don’t put salt in the sugar bowl. One cup of coffee ruined by a spoonful of salt is considered grounds for justifiable homicide.

Don’t let the air out of your neighbor’s tires—unless you’ve made your will.

Don’t drain his gasoline out on the ground. Not a lawyer in the country would dare touch your case.

Don’t sneak into an Army camp with a bugle and blow reveille an hour early. Tearing you limb from limb would expend valuable military energy.

Above all, don’t jump up and surprise your acquaintances shouting: “heil Hitler!”

They may not know what day it is—and there’s enough absenteeism without taking time out to attend fools’ funerals.

P.S.—April Fool! There’s no such thing as a Society for the Preservation of Practical Jokers.”

Nazis in Times Square    (April Fool’s Day – 1944)

1944timessq_lg

“When Goebbels, Hess, Hitler and Goering, suitcases in hand, marched through Times Square in New York, pedestrians ignored them. But then, maybe it’s because on closer inspection, they look suspiciously like Alexander Pope, Victor Varconi, Robert Watson and Martin Kosleck, as they appear in the movie, ‘The Hitler Gang,’ and if you’ll look at the calendar you’ll see it’s April First.” [The Ogden Standard-Examiner – Apr 1, 1944]The-Hitler-Gang-Poster

Donation

I am passionate about my site and I know you all like reading my blogs. I have been doing this at no cost and will continue to do so. All I ask is for a voluntary donation of $2, however if you are not in a position to do so I can fully understand, maybe next time then. Thank you. To donate click on the credit/debit card icon of the card you will use. If you want to donate more then $2 just add a higher number in the box left from the PayPal link. Many thanks.

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