One of the most unusual hoaxes in the history of photography, perpetrated by two preteen English girls in the summer of 1917. During World War I, Frances Griffiths, age 10, returned home thoroughly wet one afternoon, explaining to her unsympathetic mother that she had fallen into a brook while playing with the local fairies. Her 13-year-old cousin Elsie Wright, feeling sorry for Frances, resolved to borrow her father’s camera and a single photographic plate and photograph the fairies as proof of Frances’s story. When Arthur Wright developed the girl’s plate, he saw a picture of Frances surrounded by four tiny dancing women. A month later Elsie supplied him with another picture, featuring herself encouraging a tiny figure to jump into her lap. Arthur Wright suspected the girls of playing tricks with the camera and refused to allow them to take any more pictures
Three years later the Cottingley Fairies came to public notice when Elsie’s mother Polly Wright attended a lecture on folklore and fairy beliefs. Mrs. Wright supplied copies of the photos to Edward L. Gardner, a London investigator into the occult. Gardner had the photos reproduced by a friend, H. Snelling, and gave a public lecture on them. He also brought them to the attention of Sir Arthur Conan doyle, the author of the Sherlock Holmes stories and an enthusiastic supporter of spiritualism. During the summer of 1920, Gardner met with Elsie and gave her a modern camera. He received in return three more pictures of fairies.