Scientific Hoax as a Technology of Resistance
45
otherwise, there must be water, the story was calculated to
injure the mine. A joke is a joke, but such a joke as this
becomes serious in its consequences in proportion as it is
successful, (ctn. 2, scrapbk. 2)
Two points about this media reaction are important for our purposes of
examining De Quille’s hoaxes as a technology of resistance. First, both editorials
prove that De Quille’s hoaxes were immediately related to current political
debates by contemporary readers. The “joke is a joke” comment by the San
Francisco Stock Report editors reveals a belief that what was printed in the papers
imposed on people’s good faith and could have serious repercussions nationally.
De Quille counted on this very effect of the news media, as we will see shortly.
Second, the “trade dollars” issue mentioned in the Union reprint is important for
framing De Quille’s politics. “Trade dollars” were a controversial minting of
heavy silver dollars by the U.S. Mint in 1873 in order to shoulder the standard
Mexican peso out of currency in the Far East, where America was interested in
e xpanding her market share. According to numismatist Anthony Vigliotta, some
of these “trade dollars” trickled back to the States, which they were never meant
to do and, coupled with a drop in silver stock prices in 1876, created an
unfortunate surplus of silver currency, especially on the West Coast. This glut led
to employers abusing their employees by paying them the undervalued trade
dollars, which were refused b