Random Musings of a Lorekeeper II

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Cardiff Giant

Cardiff Giant today

Frauds, hoaxes and the Fringe oft do contain a seed of truth. What makes this hoax so alluring at first blush is that we *do* indeed have giants among us. In some cases, this size is merely the upper end of what is normal for humans. In other cases, it is caused by a medical condition called ‘gigantism’, characterized by excessive growth and height, far beyond the norm. People suffering from gigantism (also known as somatomegaly) often have a host of other, related medical issues. This condition is not a result of normal genetic variance, but a medical imbalance caused by an overproduction of growth hormone when the person is young, often due to a damaged pituitary gland. Acromegaly is another condition, often affecting people in middle age, characterized by slow changes in size and features. This condition is also caused by damage to the pituitary gland.

Cases of gigantism, in any form, are quite rare. Even individuals in the upper end of normal human height ranges are rare. However, in centuries past, our ancestors, at least…. our ancestors who were Christian... fervently believed in the existence at one point in time of an entire race of giants because the Bible said so. They (and many today…) believe that what the Bible says is to be taken literally, as historical truth, rather than myths, legends and allegoric lessons. Perhaps the most famous Biblical giant was Goliath, who, if the measurements are translated, stood over 10 feet tall.

Needless to say, when the Cardiff Giant was first unearthed in October of 1869, in Cardiff, New York, it was taken as fact. Thankfully, that was not to last! Unlike some hoaxes, the case of the Cardiff Giant was easy enough to debunk once the scientists became involved. The Cardiff Giant was unearthed when a group of workers was doing some digging on a farm. They came across evidence of something buried and worked to excavate it. When they were done, they had uncovered what appeared to be the petrified body of a gigantic man. Petrified, mind you, not mummified. This was a body of stone, some 10 feet tall, with a shoulder width of 3 feet. Word quickly spread of the find and the person whose land it was found one, one Stub Newell, erected a tent over his petrified man and began charging the sum of .50$ per person for a viewing. Newell himself garnered several thousand dollars worth of admission fees and the spectacle of the Giant brought a business boom to Cardiff and nearby Syracuse in terms of tourist traffic.

It took only a month for rumors began to fly that the Giant was a fake. A local resident, one Daniel Luce, came forward with a story of seeing an extremely large wagon bearing a sizable and heavy load headed towards Cardiff the previous year. Next came the stories from Newell’s relatives that he had been bragging about a profitable fraud he was perpetuating. However, the most devastating testimony came from professional geologists, archaeologists and paleontologists who had viewed the Giant. They all declared, almost immediately, that the Giant was a statue and if it were being passed off as a ‘petrified human’, then it was a hoax and not a very good one.

“It is positively absurd to consider this a fossil man. It has none of the indications that would designate it as such, when examined by a practical chemist, geologist, or naturalist.”

        -Dr. J. F. Boynton, ‘The Lafayette Wonder’, Syracuse Daily Journal, Oct. 20th, 1869.

In the beginning, these scientists believed that the Giant might be a valid artifact of antiquity. One theory was that it was a statue crafted by Jesuits who had once lived in the area between 1520 and 1760 CE. A well-known sculptor, Eratus Palmer, examined the Giant from a sculptor’s perspective and found evidence of sculpting toolmarks on the ‘body’. Further damaging evidence came to light when the area the Giant was excavated from was examined and it was found that the burial was far more recent, perhaps only a year or two. Dr. Boynton, one of the scientists who were investigating the Giant, determined that it was carved of a soft stone known as gypsum. This was important because gypsum would not have survived centuries in the soil of the area. It would have eroded away long before now. Boynton determined, based on how gypsum weathers and the soil type of the area in questions, that the Giant had likely only been buried just over a year. Another scientist, Othniel Marsh, declared the Giant to be ‘remarkable.’  Marsh went on to clarify that it was a ‘remarkable fake.’

The skepticism of scientists such as Marsh and Boynton, along with others, made the newspapers, at least, rethink their previous endorsement of the Giant. It wasn’t enough to sway public opinion though. However, in December of 1869, George Hull, a relative of Newell’s, came forth and admitted that the Giant was a hoax. Hull was a devout atheist and the idea to create the Giant came after a long and heated argument with a travelling Methodist minister who insisted on the literalness of the biblical stories. Hull disagreed, believing those stories were allegory at best and tall tales at worst. Hull commissioned distant sculptors to craft the statue, then had it transported to Newell’s farm and buried. There it lay for over a year, till Newell uncovered it. Needless to say, the religious ministers who had been using the Cardiff Giant in their sermons as an example of the Bible’s truth, were less than pleased with Hull’s confessions. It was even said that the Giant really wasn’t a fake and that Hull had been coerced into a ‘confession’ by the neighboring towns who were jealous of the attention that Cardiff, and later Syracuse, had garnered from the attraction of the Giant. Unfortunately for them, Hull’s confession was too detailed to ignore. Then the sculptors came forward to add to the confession and it was all over after that.