STUDENTS HOAX

Hokitika Guardian, 15 November 1933, Page 8

STUDENTS HOAX

MONEY FOR CHARITIES

SCOTTISH PEOPLE DECEIVED

Thousands of people were deceived by a hoax planned by some Scottish high school students a few weeks ago, in aid of local charities

They inserted un a newspaper at Port 'Glasgow, a paragraph saying that a “Miss Tynue” had left Vancouver on ,a secret record-breaking Atlantic flight, a nd had cashed near Port Glasgow. With Miss Tynne, it was stated, was “Mr Ellis Dee,” her mechanic, who was rendering her first aid. Finally it was said that Miss Tynne would make •a public statement about her flight expei’iencee at the Greenock Central Station that night.

In spite of the name Tynne—an allusion to “tin” in the sense oi money—and the obviously suspicious sound of “Mr 'Ellis Dee,’’ a great ■many people took the p ragraph seriously. Among other things, kindhearted sympathisers r ng up the hospital to inquire how poor Mi s s Tynne was getting on; .inundated the police station with questions about the mishap; |set off in search of souvenirs of the wrecked aeroplane ; and generally became excited at having, as they imagined, an Atlantic High; heroine in their midst. All this assisted the high school students in their object of collecting a crowd at Greenock Station to meet Miss Tynne and then to collect money from the crowd in aid of local charities.

“Although you would have thought that anybody would have Been that the paragraph was a hoax, yet no end of people h’.ve believed it to be true,” an officer at Port Glasgow police station said wearily to a reporter. “We have had no end of inquiries about it. People who have taken the report seriously have also telegraphed or telephoned the ‘news’ to friends in all parts of the country.”

“Mis® .Tynne” and “Mr Ellis Dee ’ left Port Glasgow by train in the evening for Greenock. On arrival there they wore met by hundreds of students and many residents, and they were escorted through, the principal streets heralded as the two “Canadian fliers’* who had flown the v'Jdantic in four day® and had come to grief at Port Glasglow. One of the student organisers said to. a reporter: “It. hr« been a great stunt... In fact, it .has been the stunt of stunts so-..f ar a® students’ charity day s are concerned. Little Greenock has beaten London and Glasgow for advance publicity- for student yharity schemes.”