Wild boar bomb drama? No, you fool!
Leeds Castle rebranding as Kent Castle, traffic calming measures at Brands Hatch and police bunnies being used to find cocaine stuffed in carrots – weird announcements seem to appear at this time of year with unnerving regularity, but remember to check the date before you believe them. Saturday will be April Fools’ Day and if you didn’t get caught out, there’s always a few that do.
Recent years have seen the day dominated by big businesses, grasping at the opportunity to get laughs and attention on social media – but a trawl through the KM archives reveals a few oldschool pranks, played in the pure spirit of April-foolery. Back in 1983, villagers in Sandhurst awoke on the morning of April 1 to find they were apparently going to lose their village green, with a large sign placed on it, stating it was now a “KCC development site for mosque”. The hoax was the idea of
Guy Matthews and Trefor Rutherford, both of Cranbrook School, and whether or not their schoolmasters approved is not recorded.
If they didn’t, those teachers could at least take some solace from the fact the pranksters had done their homework – their notices had all the hallmarks of officialdom, headed with “Tunbridge
Wells Borough Council, Town Council, Town and Country Planning Act 1971. Notice under section 28”.
Fast forward to 2008, and horse riders around Wrotham were reading the April edition of the parish magazine with some concern – as it announced the parish council was going to ban horse riding in and around the village.
As April Fools go, it’s perhaps not the most ridiculous, and a few were no doubt taken in, not least one Colin Stevens who called the Kent Messenger to express his dismay.
It wasn’t until Mr Stevens bumped into the perpetrator, parish council vice-chairman Cllr Pete Gillin, in the Rose and Crown Pub the following Monday, that he discovered he’d been had.
“I fell for it hook, line and sinker,” he said.
“When I first thought they were planning to do this I was shocked and thought ‘what are people going to do if they get away with this’. But when I found out it was a joke I laughed. There’s no fool like an old fool.”
Cllr Gillin explained he wrote a parish council meeting report every month for the magazine and admitted “they are not always the most riveting of events”, adding: “April 1 was an opportunity to bring a little bit of lighthearted fun to the report. I hope that everyone took it in the spirit it was intended.” A few years later, over in Pembury, residents might have been left a little concerned over a report on Twitter, suggesting a wild boar had dug up a grenade.
The Kent Messenger put a positive spin on it, albeit definitely not so positive if you were the wild boar in question.
“Wild Boar bolognese anyone?” reported the paper. “If this grenade had gone off there would have been enough to feed the whole of Pembury for a week.
“Fortunately, this picture of a wild boar with a freshly unearthed grenade is a fake generated for April Fools’ Day and posted on Twitter, with the message: ‘PEMBURY:
Wild boars digging for food have unearthed an old LIVE grenade. A 300m cordon is in place.’
“The image was first posted by ‘Ralf Polio’ whose name is an anagram of April Fool, who hadn’t tweeted before and hasn’t since and whose profile includes a calendar with a picture of a wild boar on April 1.”
A police spokesman later said they take hoaxes very seriously and will prosecute if necessary, but added “in this instance the picture was obviously an April Fool and no one was taken in by it”.
But April Fools’ Day isn’t always about trying to strike
the fear of God into people. Pictures from Sutton Valence in 2007 show it’s perfectly possible to just have a bit of laugh without victimising anyone – that’s presuming the lump hammer Natalie Boult was holding here is just a toy one.
The fun was part of Mike Dunn’s celebrations at his antiques business, the Aladdin’s Cave of Swan
Barn, in Broad Street, Sutton Valence, where contests included the noisiest, silliest walk and the shortest, fattest legs.
Silly walks, of a kind, also seem to have been the theme one April 1 in Lenham, although an element of mystery surrounds exactly what was going on back in 2005.
The Kent Messenger archives revealed this picture of two Lenham chaps – John Philpott and Alan Huggett – with an April Fools poster for Lenham Square, but no trace of an article remains on the subject. Headed with the European
Union flag, the notice claims to be “European Harmonisation Directive No. 040105” (note the suspiciously familiar number) and concerns “Right-hand adoption – Lenham Square”. The directive goes on to state new rules for the square which include:
All pedestrians will be required to walk to the right of the walkway. A white line painted down the centre must not be crossed except in an emergency.
Circulation round the square will be anti-clockwise. This will mean only certain crossing points can be used. These will be situated in Maidstone Road, Faversham Road and High Street.
Shops located in the
Square will have to adhere to the right-hand directive. All entrance door handles must be located on the right.
And it was signed: “Loof Lirpa”, which might sound like a European official, but is undoubtedly more British when spelt backwards.
All of which sounds hilariously silly enough but with no article to correspond with the picture, we have no way of knowing how the prank turned out.
Were Messrs Philpott and Huggett responsible, or did they just discover the poster? And did anyone fall for it and start abiding by the new rules?
Current and past parish council chairmen were unable to recall the prank, but perhaps someone out there is still holding on to the truth behind it, chuckling away to themselves every April Fools’ Day.
Whether they’re laughing or crying every anniversary of Brexit, we’re unlikely to ever know.
‘I fell for it hook, line and sinker. I was shocked and thought what are people going to do if they get away with this? When I found out it was a joke I laughed. There’s no fool like an old fool’