The Moon People in the New York Sun
In the sense that it relied primarily on revenue from advertising as its main income, The Sun, published in New York was the world’s first modern newspaper. Advertising fees were based on a projection of how many people would see them, so circulation numbers were critical to the newspaper’s survival. The Sun was founded in 1833 and was one of the first newspapers in America to hire reporters who were tasked with researching events and writing stories about them for public consumption. Before The Sun most stories printed in newspapers were provided by readers or rewritten from the content of other newspapers.
Advertising fees were based on circulation. In 1835, The Sun, which was sold on the street by vendors as well as delivered to homes and businesses, had a daily circulation of around 8,000 copies. The Sun’s editor, Richard Adams Locke, produced a story based on the work of astronomer John Herschel. According to The Sun, Herschel had observed life on the moon, using a telescope in South Africa. The series of six stories began on August 25, 1835, after being announced four days earlier, and The Sun claimed that it was being reprinted from reports in a Scottish newspaper.
The story described animals living on the moon similar to those found on earth in some cases, and others mythical to earth such as unicorns. Herschel was described as seeing winged bipedal figures similar in body to humans, with temples and other buildings in cities. Oceans, rivers and lakes were described.
John Herschel was then in South Africa, occupied with serious scientific lunar observations, and when he became aware of the story he found it entertaining, and even remarked on it to colleagues, although later he found himself beset with questions from some who read it and believed it to be true. Locke’s motivation for writing the story, which was never retracted by The Sun, is unknown. It may have been simply to increase circulation, or it may have been a satirical response to outlandish scientific “discoveries” claimed by some and published in other newspapers.
The circulation for The Sun shot up for a time, but the long term effect of the story, which by mid-fall was known to be entirely false, remains questionable. The Sun’s story may have inspired French writer Jules Verne, who referred to it in his novel From the Earth to the Moon more than thirty years later. The series ended by reporting that the lens of Herschel’s unique telescope had been destroyed by solar rays, starting a fire which burned down his observatory, and no further reports were possible.