The Central Park Zoo escape hoax

NOV 09 1874

The New York Herald's front page of 9 November 1874 described a mass breakout from the Central Park menagerie, with a rhinoceros goring its keeper and a lion, polar bear, panther, hyenas and a Bengal tiger loose in the city, claiming 49 dead and 200 injured. The piece was written by J. I. C. Clarke under managing editor T. B. Connery, who had witnessed a leopard's near-escape and wanted to dramatise the zoo's poor safety precautions. A disclaimer at the very end stated that not one word of it was true, but many readers panicked before reaching it.