6 Historical Hoaxes That Are Too Stupid Even For 2017

The attacks got worse and worse as the Jacksons made their way along the campaign trail, setting a precedent that candidates' wives were now fair game for political sniping. Rachel was ridiculed for her weight, her rural background, and, of course, the botched marriage. To make matters worse, Jackson's opponents continually compared his wife to John Quincy Adams' wife, Louisa, considered to be more appropriate for the White House than Rachel almost exclusively because she was wealthy and pretty.

Sadly, although her husband's political career survived the rumors and he won the presidency, Mrs. Jackson would never set foot in the White House as first lady. The anguish from being repeatedly ridiculed caused Rachel to sink into a deep depression, and she died of a heart attack before the inauguration. Jackson himself attributed the death to the attacks against her, and -- while making clear that we are ourselves not doctors and can't claim firsthand knowledge of the medical conditions at play -- he was 100 percent right.

According to the Democratic-Republicans who cried "hoax," the Federalists spread the report of Jefferson's death so that he wouldn't be honored on the Fourth for writing the Declaration of Independence, and indeed, a lot of the discussion in the newspapers that reported on his "death" was eye-wateringly acidic. Consider the Connecticut Courant, where one of those tricksy Federalists wrote that on a slow news day, "some compassionate being ... very humanely killed Mr. Jefferson."

Hitler insisted on a special location for the surrender ceremony: the train car where the 1918 armistice was signed that ended WWI and bent Germany over a barrel for the next couple decades. It was symbolic, see, and of course there would be cameras there to capture the great irony of Germany's triumph on the site of their last defeat. But little did Hitler suspect that these cameras would also capture something that would make him look like a complete idiot.

You see, at one point during the signing, Hitler took a weirdly high step backward, as if suddenly startled by a mouse.

Where many saw only tragedy and a tyrant standing like a flamingo, one man saw a way to bring laughter back to the Allies. John Grierson, a Scottish filmmaker, looped the clip so that it would look like Hitler decided to do a goofy hopping dance.

The reel was a sensation, sweeping through theaters across the Allied world during one of the darker periods of the war. It provided a little bit of laughter during a much-needed time, and paved the way for generations of comedians to take cheap shots at Hitler.

But the bigger attack was to come. Knutston questioned the president about whether he left his pet dog behind and ordered a destroyer to turn around -- at an estimated cost of $20 million -- to bring him home.

At the time, FDR's love for his pet dog, a tiny terrier called Fala, was well-known, so it seemed entirely reasonable that he would misappropriate a destroyer to rescue him. It didn't happen, though. The Navy harshly denied the report, and Knutson soon backed down.

You know who didn't let it go, however? FDR. With some input from, no biggie, Orson Welles -- who often moonlighted as FDR's speechwriter -- he used the incident to give the Republicans a damn good kicking in his next campaign speech, accusing them of hurting his dog's feelings because they were incapable of dealing with the real problems facing the country.

In the game of political slap fights, nothing beats making your opponent look like they were being a dick to an animal.

Lenin's got a shitty deal going on too.

And in November 1991, it looked like it was going to get a lot worse. The USSR was teetering on the edge of destruction, and money was in short supply. Like, more than it usually was. A situation which led, as reported by Christopher Buckley at Forbes, to the Soviets issuing a press release that stated they were looking to sell Lenin for a cool $15 million.

There were some restrictions, of course. The buyer couldn't buy the body and let it rot. They'd be responsible for preserving it in mint condition -- at a cost of $10-15k per year -- and they also couldn't use the body for commercial reasons or exhibitions or skirting carpool regulations.

The Soviets swiftly issued a denial calling the whole thing an "impudent lie" and "an unpardonable provocation," and Buckley was forced to out his fakery. But that didn't stop the bargain-hunters. Within days, would-be buyers had flooded the Kremlin's phones, offering Lenin a new home everywhere from a museum, to a car dealership, to a seat in the new lobby of a printing company, like the most awesome episode of The Office we never got to see.

The rumor was too perfect not to believe. It fed into the general air of conspiracy surrounding the assassination, and was supported by the existing perception that LBJ had it out for JFK. And it's fair to say that LBJ had some ... issues when it came to his wang. Trust us, we're practically the internet's foremost experts on the subject. So when the rumor began to spread about LBJ "firing another round" into JFK, the country shrugged and said, "Yep, that sounds about right."

In everyone's speed to trademark #Throatgate, however, they forgot to check who the source of this story was. The Realist wasn't just a counterculture magazine; it was a satire magazine. The author of the piece, Paul Krassner, mimicked the writing style of Manchester and basically set out to write out the most libelous thing he could, knowing that the worst thing LBJ could do in retaliation was come out and deny the charges.

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