The 5 god-tier April Fools pranks that people can’t believe actually happened

April Fools Day is equal parts a day of joy, goofery, groans, and annoyance. A bad April Fools joke is seen as unfunny at best or outright fraud at worst. A good April Fools joke or prank brings some levity and cleverness into a person’s first day of the month. However, the greatest April Fools pranks are the stuff of absolute legend.

Here are a few April Fools pranks throughout history that frankly cannot be beaten.

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BBC Spaghetti Trees

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In 1957, the normally stoic and serious BBC News played a prank on their viewers by covering a news story that Switzerland’s milder winter season and near-extinction of the “spaghetti weevil” caused an abundance of spaghetti crops in the nation. They even go into how proper tree breeding causes the spaghetti strands to be uniform in length. It was so convincing that the BBC received calls from viewers asking where they could purchase their own spaghetti bushes.

Taco Bell Buys the Liberty Bell

Pictured: The newspaper ad announcing Taco Bell's purchase of the Liberty Bell.Photo credit: @lateralus1665

Many corporations and restaurant chains have some fun hoaxes shelling out fake products on April Fools Day, but not many got as much publicity as when Taco Bell claimed to have purchased the Liberty Bell in 1996. Philadelphians were shocked not just at the purchase, but that the Liberty Bell was going to be renamed the “Taco Liberty Bell” and that the historical landmark would be relocated to Taco Bell’s corporate headquarters in California.

While meant to be a national advertisement, the prank was a little bit too successful as some newspapers and radio stations played along with the prank while others thought the purchase was legitimate. This caused the National Park Service, which houses the Liberty Bell, to be bombarded with calls from angry Americans that the national symbol was being sold to a fast food chain. After confessing that it was a hoax, the ad campaign/prank cost Taco Bell not only $300,000 but an additional $50,000 donation to help upkeep of the Liberty Bell as a gesture of goodwill.

The Tower of London’s “Washing of the Lions”

One of the later announcements of the fake "Washing of the Lions" events.Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons

This 1698 prank is considered the earliest recorded April Fools Day joke in history. It’s a recurring prank usually done to London tourists in which they’d be directed by locals to go to a moat near the Tower of London at “the White Gate” to see lions get their annual bath in the moat’s waters. Since there was no White Gate at all, tourists would wander aimlessly looking for it near the tower. Even if the White Gate existed, there were no lions, much less lions being washed in the first place.

Dutch TV Tax Prank That Caused an Aluminum Foil Shortage

This prank went a little too far...Photo credit: Canva

In 1969, the broadcaster NTS in the Netherlands reported that inspectors with remote scanners would be driving down the streets to find people who haven’t paid the TV/radio tax to the government. They claimed that the only way to prevent the scanners from detecting their devices would be wrapping them up in tin foil. Sure enough, gullible viewers and listeners caused all supermarkets to sell out of aluminum foil and there was a giant surge of tax payments for radio/TV service.

A Fake Volcanic Eruption

The smoky prank that was confused for an actual volcanic eruption.Photo credit: Harold Wahlman

After four years of planning, on April Fools Day of 1974, Oliver “Porky” Bickar and a few of his friends scaled up 3,202 feet on Mount Edgecumbe in Alaska to set up an elaborate prank that included the assistance of clear skies, local police, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), and a helicopter. To what end? To create a fake volcanic eruption.

The helicopter pilot helped Bickar and his crew load up the dormant Mt. Edgecumbe with tires, kerosene, and rags to light them all up on fire. The black plume of smoke in the clear skies caused panic in the communities nearby that would be impacted by a volcanic eruption. While local police and the FAA were clued in on the prank, the Coast Guard was not. They sent a pilot up in the skies to investigate the eruption. What they found below the black smoke was Bickar next to a giant spray painted sign that only had two words in 50-foot tall letters: “APRIL FOOL.”