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© Copyright 1998, Jim Loy
Fairy Tale, A True Story is a movie which was recently released on Video Tape. It gives a good feel for English country life, in the late 19th Century (including a convincing Harry Houdini). The story is mostly true. Two little girls photographed fairies. The photographs came to the attention of Arthur Conan Doyle, who published them. Some people declared the photographs authentic.
Over the years, the main argument in favor of the girls has been that they were too unsophisticated to perpetrate a hoax which could fool experts. Some of the photos look pretty good. A couple look very suspicious. Unfortunately, the movie does not mention that a few years ago, one of the little girls, now an elderly lady, confessed to the hoax. The girls found pictures of fairies in books, and then cut them out with scissors, propped them up on blades of grass and branches of trees etc., and then took their photographs.
Like many hoaxes (Piltdown Man, possibly), this one was done in fun. And when the public took it seriously, it was too late to confess.
Addendum:
Why were expert photographers and scientists fooled into saying the photos were not fakes? Well, the photos were not fakes; the fairies were fakes. The experts were asked to examine the photos, to see if they had been faked. There was no evidence of trickery there. But they should have suggested that perhaps the girls used pictures of fairies instead of real fairies. The experts failed again.