The Cardiff Giant
15:04 Share

In 1869, the world was shocked by a discovery that was made outside of the town of Cardiff, New York. Two workers discovered what was claimed to be the remains of a 10-foot-tall, petrified human being. The claim set off a fiery debate between those who thought it was proof of the Bible and those who thought it was just a long-lost statue. It turned out neither group was correct. Learn more about the Cardiff Giant and one of the biggest hoaxes of the 19th century on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily.

This episode is sponsored by Quince. You've heard me talk several times now about Quince and how I've gotten some great items for my home, like my Turkish bath towels and my fisherman's blanket. Quince has must-haves like Mongolian cashmere sweaters from $50, iconic 100% leather jackets, and comfortable pants for every occasion. With Quince, I can get high-end, versatile pieces at prices I can actually afford. All Quince items are priced 50% to 80% less than similar brands.

By partnering directly with top factories, Quince cuts out the cost of the middleman and passes the savings on to you. And Quince only works with factories that use safe, ethical, and responsible manufacturing practices, along with premium fabrics and finishes.

Indulge in affordable luxury. Go to quince.com daily for free shipping on your order and 365-day returns. That's q-u-i-n-c-e dot com slash daily to get free shipping and 365-day returns. Once again, quince.com slash daily. This episode is sponsored by Up First.

Breaking news is broken. You're constantly doom-scrolling on Facebook, Twitter, or TikTok to get the latest updates so you don't miss anything. If this sounds like you, I recommend that you listen to the Up First podcast by NPR. Up First provides the top three news stories to start your day. With digestible 10-15 minute episodes, which is about the length of this podcast, it's all the news you need so you can get back to your life feeling informed while letting you get ready, make breakfast, or go to work.

From politics to economics and both national and international news, Up First is the go-to daily habit for the news consumer who wants to stay informed but is forever strapped for time. On recent episodes of Up First, I've been able to get the latest updates on trade policy, the stock market, and other topics that have helped me make informed decisions. Up First is the cure you need for your news fatigue. It lets you stay informed on the top stories while allowing you to spend the rest of your day on things more productive or enjoyable.

Listen now to the Up First podcast from NPR. The Cardiff Giant was, for a very brief time, one of the biggest news stories of the 19th century in the United States. It garnered an enormous amount of publicity and large crowds, which subsequently led to a lot of money. The story starts in October of 1869 in upstate New York. A man by the name of William C. Stubb Newell had a farm outside the town of Cardiff, which is just south of the city of Syracuse.

On October 16th of that year, he hired two men to dig him a well. He gave them the exact spot where to dig and let them do their work. Soon after they began digging, the men's shovels hit what appeared to be someone's foot. A very large foot. They continued to excavate, clearing the tree roots that were surrounding the object, and found what appeared to be a very large stone man. He would have been approximately 10 feet tall, which is a bit over 3 meters.

One of the workers was reported to have said, quote, I declare some old Indian has been buried here. Word traveled quickly in the surrounding area that something had been discovered on Stubb Newell's farm. As the Syracuse Journal reported at the time, quote, men left their work, women caught up their babies, and all children in numbers all hurried to the scene where the interest of that little community centered. At first, Newell was very perplexed by the discovery and actually proposed burying it again and forgetting about the entire affair.

However, Newell quickly realized the financial potential and erected a tent around the supposed fossil and started charging 50 cents per visitor. Within a short time, the price was raised to a dollar due to the overwhelming interest. Thousands of people flocked to the farm to see the discovery in just the first week. People set up food stalls nearby to cater to all the people coming to the site. Local hotels and boarding houses did more business than had ever been done before.

While Newell claimed that it was a major discovery, he never said what it exactly was or what he thought it was. As people began flocking to the site to see the discovery, they began making their own theories as to what it was. Each observer, depending on their background, beliefs, and expertise, formed different theories about its origin and significance.

Some people, particularly devout religious individuals, believe that the giant was direct evidence supporting biblical accounts of giants in the land, as was described in Genesis 6-4, which said, There were giants in the earth in those days, and also after that when the sons of God came unto the daughters of men. To them, the petrified figure was proof that the stories from the Bible about giants were literally true, and they saw the discovery as a miraculous confirmation of their faith.

They claim that the giant man had been petrified, similar to the way that wood can become petrified by minerals replacing organic matter. Others, particularly those with knowledge of Native American history, propose that the figure was an ancient statue carved by indigenous peoples. Given the number of burial mounds and stone structures attributed to prehistoric cultures in North America, they assume the Cardiff Giant was a sacred effigy or religious idol left behind by an ancient civilization.

Some even speculated that it might have been part of an unknown pre-Columbian artistic or religious tradition. The first geologist on the scene was John F. Boynton. He didn't think that it could possibly be a petrified man. He thought that it was most probably a statue carved by French Jesuits in the 16th or 17th century to impress the natives in the region.

A few more pragmatic individuals saw that the whole event was a clever scam. Some local farmers and business people, wary of how the site was turned into a profitable attraction, suspected from the beginning that the discovery was staged for financial gain. They questioned why Newell was so eager to charge admission and why he had been so secretive about the circumstances leading up to the discovery. One of the early visitors was Andrew D. White, the first president of Cornell University.

He assessed the giant and where it was discovered and came to his own conclusion. He noted, quote,

Being asked my opinion, my answer was that the whole matter was undoubtedly a hoax, that there was no reason why the farmer should dig a well in the spot where the figure was found, that it was convenient neither to the house nor the barn, that there was already a good spring and a stream of water running conveniently to both, that, as to the figure itself, it should certainly not have been carved by any prehistoric race since no part of it showed the characteristics of any such early work.

that, as rude as it was, it betrayed the qualities of a modern performance of a low order. The Cardiff Giant's popularity grew rapidly, attracting attention from investors. A group led by David Hannum, a Syracuse banker, purchased a three-fourths interest in the Giant for $30,000, the equivalent to about $600,000 today. They moved it to Syracuse and planned an even larger exhibition.

This led to a famous rivalry when P.T. Barnum, the legendary showman, attempted to buy the giant for $50,000. When Hannum refused, Barnum made his own fake Cardiff giant and began exhibiting it in New York City, claiming that it was the real one. This prompted Hannum to remark, quote, there's a sucker born every minute, a phrase often misattributed to Barnum himself. Now, at this point in the story, I need to majorly shift gears.

I began the episode with the discovery of the Cardiff Giant on October 16, 1869. However, that is not the start of the story. The story of the Cardiff Giant actually began over a year earlier in 1868 with a man by the name of George Hull, a tobacconist from Birmingham, New York. He was an anomaly in the 19th century in that he was an atheist. In fact, a rather fervent atheist.

During a business trip to Iowa, he got into a heated theological debate with an itinerant preacher. During their debate, he was shocked at how literally the preacher took the Bible. In particular, the previously mentioned verse from Genesis about giants that roam the earth. From this debate, Hall got an idea. He decided to create a hoax that would challenge biblical literalism and show believers to be gullible, while potentially making himself a whole lot of money.

Hull knew that the success of the hoax depended on making the giant look as if it had been buried for centuries. He chose gypsum, a soft, easily carved sedimentary rock because it resembled petrified flesh. He found a suitable 10.5-foot-long block of gypsum in Fort Dodge, Iowa, an area known for its high-quality stone deposits.

To avoid suspicion, Hull did not purchase the stone directly. Instead, he had a local man named Henry Prast acquire it for him under the pretense of needing it for a monument for Abraham Lincoln. Once purchased, the massive block, weighing nearly three tons, was shipped discreetly to Chicago via railroad. Hull hired a German stonecutter by the name of Edward Burkhart, along with two sculptors, to carve the block into the likeness of a human figure.

The process took several weeks and was conducted in secrecy in a barn on West 12th Street in Chicago. The sculptors crafted the figure to appear as lifelike as possible, with exaggerated details such as visible ribs and a facial expression that suggested suffering. Hull deliberately instructed them to add creases on the body, suggesting the appearance of aged, shriveled skin. To further mimic the natural texture of human skin, the sculptors used a needle to create tiny pores on the surface.

Once the carving was complete, Hull needed to make the figure appear ancient. To accomplish this, he used various methods to artificially weather the stone. The entire surface was washed with sulfuric acid to erode its sharp edges and give it a worn, fossilized appearance. A combination of stains and ink was rubbed into its surface to darken the stone, making it appear as though it had been buried for centuries.

The sculptors used hammers and brushes to create tiny scratches, pits, and wear marks, mimicking the natural erosion that occurs over time. Once the treatment was complete, the Cardiff Giant looked convincingly ancient, with rough textures and discoloration that suggested years of burial and exposure to the elements. After the carving process was finished, Hull arranged for the giant to be transported to Cardiff, New York. He hired a team to move the three-ton figure via train, taking precautions to avoid raising suspicions.

Upon arrival, he took it to the farm of his cousin, Stubb Newell. They carefully buried the carving under tree roots to make it look as if it had been there a while. And once it was buried, they waited. They waited for over a year until October of 1869 when Hull finally told Newell to resurrect the giant.

By December 1869, skepticism surrounding the Cardiff Giant was growing. Scientists such as Othniel C. March, a leading paleontologist at Yale University, dismissed the giant as an obvious fake. Finally, on December 10th, less than two months after the giant was exhumed, George Hall came forward to the press and admitted that the entire affair was a hoax.

However, he didn't sheepishly admit to being guilty of a hoax. He was rather proud of it. He explained why he did it and that he wanted to show those who literally believed in the Bible to be gullible. The sculptor who created the giant in Chicago eventually provided testimony confirming Hull's story. One interesting side note to the story, when P.T. Barnum created his replica of the Cardiff Giant, he was sued by the owners of the actual fake giant,

In February of 1870, both Giants were revealed in court to be fakes, and the judge in the case ruled in favor of Barnum. In his ruling, he basically said that you can't be guilty of copying a hoax. Believe it or not, after the Cardiff Giant was exposed as a hoax, there was still interest in seeing it. The Giant was on display at the 1901 Pan American Exposition in Buffalo, New York.

It was eventually sold to the Iowa newspaper publisher Gardner Cowles Jr., who used it as a table for his rumpus room. In 1947, he sold it to the Farmers Museum in Cooperstown, New York, where it is still displayed today. The museum recognizes its historical significance, not just as an example of 19th century fraud, but also as a symbol of America's fascination with spectacle, curiosity, and belief.

Barnum's copy of the Giant is supposedly located at Marvin's Marvelous Mechanical Museum, a game arcade and museum located in Farmington Hills, Michigan. Another later copy of the Giant, carved in 1972 from the same gypsum, can be found at the Fort Museum and Frontier Village in Fort Dodge, Iowa.

The Cardiff Giant inspired several other hoaxes in the 19th century, including the Solid Muldoon in Beulah, Colorado, the Teganek Giant supposedly found in Teganek Falls State Park in New York, and the Petrified Man in Fort Benton, Montana. The Cardiff Giant remains one of the most famous hoaxes in history, illustrating the power of human gullibility, sensationalism, and the commercial exploitation of curiosity.

Since then, the Cardiff Giant has become a metaphor for elaborate hoaxes, particularly those that gain credibility through the public's eagerness to believe. The executive producer of Everything Everywhere Daily is Charles Daniel. The associate producers are Austin Okun and Cameron Kiefer.

Today's review comes from listener Austin02 over on Apple Podcasts in the United States. They write, Great show. I love the show. As a member of the Completionist Club, I'm ready to annoy my sister even more by listening to it all again, even though she's the one who showed it to me. Do you have any other podcasts you recommend that are like this show? Well, thanks, Austin. If your sister's annoyed, then there's a simple solution. Just have her join the Completionist Club too. And as for other podcasts, well, there aren't any others that are quite like this one.

Remember, if you leave a review or send me a boostagram, you too can have it read on the show.