By 1957 most people were beginning to get television sets in the home and on 1st April the BBC broadcast one of its most famous ever programmes; a spoof documentary about spaghetti crops in Switzerland.
The Panorama programme, narrated by the normally deadly serious journalist Richard Dimbleby, featured a family from Ticino in Switzerland carrying out their annual spaghetti harvest.
That was an excellent spoof!
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The best ever I would suggest!
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I wonder if there are people around who would be fooled by that today…given the general level of credulity it is a possibility.
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I wonder. This was a long time ago.
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That was THE best spoof!
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Absolutely!
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Read about that this morning Andrew, when I was reading about some of the all time best April Fool jokes!
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This one is a real classic!
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The kind that I would love to come up with. Gullibility knows no limits. We’ve certainly learned that in modern times. 🙂 Or at least relearned it.
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When I was a young child, my daycare took us on a field trip to a popular local spaghetti joint. They herded all of us kids into a back room to watch an old movie about Italian Nonnas collecting spaghetti from spaghetti trees to feed their families. I fell for it (I was 5) and was so confused when I noticed my mother taking dried spaghetti out of a box. Why couldn’t we have our own spaghetti tree? I’m so happy that you shared this. Thank you for the memories! 💕
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Thank you for adding your memories to the post!
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I remember that when you first posted it. Great joke.
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Fortunately, this hilarious prank is preserve on video and on YouTube!
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Exactly. Thanks for reminding me!
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