April Fools Pranks Gags and Hoaxes

"How'd you get that smudge on your face?"
"Did you know you have a flat tire?"
"What's that on your neck?"
April Fools!

The rules seem pretty simple. At the end of a long, dark winter we get to celebrate the coming of Spring by pulling a prank on our friends. Pretty much anything goes, as long as the other guy is fooled and the prankster yells "April Fools!" before too much harm is done.

No one is quite sure when or how the tradition of April 1 being a day to pull jokes began, but it has been a part of European tradition for a long time. In Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, published in 1392, a fox tricks Chanticleer the rooster on "March 32nd". Renaissance poet Eloy d'Amerval reported that in 1508 it was all the rage in Paris to stick paper poisson d'avril ("April fish") to the backs of unsuspecting passersby. 

When France adopted the Gregorian Calendar and abandoned the Julian in the mid-Sixteenth century, the New Year's holiday moved from springtime to January 1. The springtime New Year's feast came to a close on April 1, so any bumpkin who hadn’t gotten the news of the Calendar change was obviously a rube, ripe for the tricking.

One of our favorite April Fools' Hoaxes took place in 1957 on the British's Panorama current affairs TV program, "The Spaghetti Tree Hoax". The program broadcast a three-minute report that thanks to a mild winter and the eradication of the Spaghetti Weevil, Southern Switzerland was harvesting a bumper crop from their spaghetti tree orchards. The show also had footage of folks in traditional garb plucking strands of fresh spaghetti from the trees (at the time, spaghetti was just starting to become popular in the UK, so many people failed to realize that pasta does not grow on trees!)

• The Chevrolet Program Starring Jack Benny, April 1, 1934. Mary gets an April Fools' prank phone call. The rest of the cast forgets that Easter fell on April 1 this year. This is Jack's last Sunday show for Chevy, he will be back on Friday for General Tire.
• The Adventures of Superman, April 1, 1946, "The Story of the Century, Pt 1". This two-week-long story arc begins on April Fools' Day with a call from editor Perry White for Clark to pick up Lois at her apartment in the middle of the night and bring her to White's house. When Clark arrives at the apartment, he finds the place has been trashed, and no Lois! What's more, Perry White never made the first call. Now, Lois calls the office, saying she has the Story of the Century, but she needs $10,000 cash right now! Editor White personally goes to meet Lois with the money and then calls Clark to get $10,000 more! It sounds like an elaborate hoax, but we may have to wait for 14 more episodes to discover who is fooling who.
• The Aldrich Family, April 1, 1948. Agnes pulls an April Fools' prank over the phone on Henry and Homer, so they turn the tables by spreading a rumor at school that Agnes won a lot of money in a magazine contest. It gets so far out of control that Mr. Aldrich thinks he has to go to New York to collect the money, and he invites Henry along. Did Agnes really win the money?
• My Favorite Husband, April 1, 1949. Liz plans a gag on George by putting a lipstick-covered hankie in his overcoat pocket, but he beats her to the punch by fibbing to her that he lost his job at the bank. Liz's joke double backfires when George really does have a lipstick covered handkerchief in his pocket. Perhaps, Liz wasn't the first to think of the joke.

Jokes, pranks, gags and hoaxes abound with Blondie, Henry Aldrich, and Red Skelton. Even Watson gets in on the act when he plays tricks on Sherlock Holmes - but only to take him down a peg, "the ol boy does take himself too seriously."

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Find out who will get caught and who will get seltzer down their pants!April may bring showers, but it also brings gags galore! So take a seat on your whoppee cushion and precariously place a bucket of water on the top of the door. These April Fools shows will get you in the mood for April First, the funniest day of the year.

For more laughs, see also our extensive comedy collections including the compilations:

• Bloopers Collection
• Candid Microphone
• Defective Detectives & Bungling Burglars
• Robert Benchley Collection
• Practical Jokers in Old Time Radio
• Soapler: Soap Opera Spoofs, Satire, and Silliness
• Western Spoofs