Unlike a lot of the special days we regularly observe, the origins of April Fools’ Day is a bit of a mystery. Also called All Fools’ Day, no-one seems to know when the first fools’ day took place. It seems to be a reasonable assumption that it was originally observed as some sort of spring ritual.

It’s most probably a relic of the once universal festivities held at the vernal equinox, beginning on old New Year’s day, the 25th March, ending on the 1st April.

Some say it dates back to 1582 when the Gregorian Calendar was introduced in France. Prior to that, the New Year was celebrated for eight days in March, culminating on April 1st. Charles IX brought in the new calendar and New Year’s Day was moved to January 1, but April 1st retained its special meaning. Some say news of the new Gregorian Calendar was slow to spread and some people continued to observe the 8-day New Years festival in late March. They were considered “fools” by the general public…now you see where this is going. The “fools” were often made the butt of practical jokes.  The tradition stuck and spread around the world.

However, this is probably just an expansion of the already existing tradition, as well this date there are French documents dated 1508 and Dutch ones from 1539 which describe April Fool’s Day jokes and the custom of making them on the first of April.

In Scotland, for example, April Fool’s Day is actually celebrated for two days. The second day is devoted to pranks involving the posterior region of the body. It is called Taily Day. The origin of the “kick me” sign can be traced to this observance.

Mexico’s counterpart of April Fool’s Day is actually observed on December 28. Originally, the day was a sad remembrance of the slaughter of the innocent children by King Herod. It eventually evolved into a lighter commemoration involving pranks and trickery.

Closer to home, a form of April-fooling has been an immemorial custom in India where the feast of Holi celebrates the spring equinox. On 31st March, the last day of the feast, the chief amusement is befooling people by sending them on fruitless errands.

Family and friends are usually the target of practical jokes, but in recent years the media has been involved. Some of the media pranks have been brilliant, some have been downright malicious resulting in legal proceedings, and termination of employment. Lets look at some of the more creative hoaxes of recent years.

Spaghetti Trees: The BBC television programme Panorama ran a famous hoax in 1957, showing the Swiss harvesting spaghetti from trees. They had claimed that the despised pest the spaghetti wevil had been eradicated. A large number of people contacted the BBC wanting to know how to cultivate their own spaghetti trees.

Alabama Changes the Value of Pi: The April 1998 newsletter of New Mexicans for Science and Reason contained an article claiming that the Alabama Legislature had voted to change the value of the mathematical constant pi to the “Biblical value” of 3.0.

Left Handed Whoppers: The ad industry is always on the lookout for a new and novel twist. In 1998, Burger King ran an ad in USA Today, saying that people could get a Whopper for left-handed people whose condiments were designed to drip out the right side. Of course “fools” began showing up to order a Left Handed Whopper. In 1996, American fast foot outlet Taco Bell took out a full-page advertisement in The New York Times announcing that they had purchased the Liberty Bell to “reduce the country’s debt” and renamed it the “Taco Liberty Bell.” Fools cried out, “How dare they! The Liberty Bell is part of our heritage.”

San Serriffe: This one is quite clever. The Guardian printed a supplement in 1977 praising San Seriffe as the ideal resort, its two main islands (Upper Caisse and Lower Caisse), its capital (Bodoni), and its leader (General Pica). Intrigued readers were later disappointed to learn that the resort doesn’t exist and the names are references to typeface terminology.

Metric time: Repeated several times in various countries, this hoax involves claiming that the time system will be changed to one in which units of time are based on powers of 10. Actually not a bad idea.

Smell-o-vision: In 1965, the BBC purported to conduct a trial of a new technology allowing the transmission of odor over the airwaves to all viewers. Many viewers reportedly contacted the BBC to report the trial’s success. This hoax was also conducted by the Seven Network in Australia in 2005.

Tower of Pisa: Prominent landmarks are often the target of practical pranks. At different times the Eiffel Tower has been painted pink, the Statue of Liberty has been given a new wardrobe and The Dutch television news reported once in the 1950s that the Tower of Pisa had fallen. Many shocked people contacted the station.

Malteaser: Even diminutive Malta has been in on the fun from time to time. National Television Station (TVM) in Malta: In 1995, TVM announced the discovery of a new underground prehistoric temple with a mummy. Another year, TVM announced that Malta would adopt the European continent convention of driving on the right-hand side of the road.

Rain drop power: On April 1st 2006 Norwegian media had a one-page story concerning “rain drop power”, which could replace oil as a primary energy source. People actually wrote to the energy company BKK in Bergen asking to volunteer and receive the power generated for free.

Defying gravity: In 1976, British astronomer Sir Patrick Moore told listeners of BBC Radio 2 that unique alignment of two planets would result in an upward gravitational pull making people lighter at precisely 9:47 a.m. that day. He invited his audience to jump in the air and experience “a strange floating sensation.” Dozens of listeners phoned in to say the experiment had worked.

Not so funny! In 2003 during the time when Hong Kong is seriously hit by the SARS epidemic, it was rumored that many people in Hong Kong had become infected with SARS and become uncontrolled, that all immigration ports would be closed to quarantine the region, and that Tung Chee Hwa, the Chief Executive of Hong Kong at that time, had resigned. Supermarkets were immediately overwhelmed by panicked shoppers. The Hong Kong government held a press conference to deny the rumor. The April Fools’ prank, was started by a student by imitating the design of Ming Pao newspaper website. He was charged for this incident.

Shady deal: Radio station 98.1 KISS in Chattanooga, Tennessee falsely announced in 2003 that rapper Eminem would be doing a free show in a discount store parking lot. Several police were needed to deal with traffic gridlock and enraged listeners who threatened to harm the DJs responsible. Both DJs were later jailed for creating a public nuisance. Also, radio station WAAF 107.3 in Boston announced that Pearl Jam was having a free concert in a fictional city in New Hampshire. A gas station in New Hampshire reported that several streams of car drivers stopped in asking for directions to the fictional town.

Hard to swallow: There was a near riot on the Australia’s Gold Coast, when radio station Sea FM announced the drinking age would be changed from 18 to 21. This left a huge number of under-21s angry and frustrated, and incited protests.

Real storm: In 2005, Estonian Radio’s station Vikerraadio broadcasted right after 9 o’clock a hoax in their morning program saying Finland had been put under a tsunami warning and wave was expected to be more than 5 meters high. It was quickly proven to be a hoax and station management were hauled on the carpet.

Dome and gloom: In 1998, the Channel 4 (London) morning show The Big Breakfast got into trouble with various authorities for pulling an April Fools stunt showing video footage of the Millennium Dome on fire.

So be advised, if you hear something on April 1st that just seems to be a bit out of the ordinary, before you rush off to tell everyone at the office, pause for a second thought. You may have been the victim of an April Fool’s Joke.