In 1957, BBC fooled people into thinking Spaghetti grew on trees. Many even phoned in to buy them.

The Italians' love for pasta is universally celebrated, but there was a time when some believed spaghetti grew on trees. Yes, you read that correctly! In an elaborate April Fool’s prank, the BBC managed to fool viewers into thinking spaghetti was harvested. To sell the joke, a three-minute report showcased a Swiss family humorously plucking long, perfectly uniform pasta strands from trees. Originally aired in 1957, the video was recently reshared by Switzerland Tourism on its official YouTube channel (@MySwitzerland). Decades later, this lighthearted hoax remains legendary, often called “the biggest hoax ever pulled by a reputable news organization.”

The prank began with the broadcaster reporting an unusually early spring across many countries, including Switzerland. The video featured stunning countryside scenes from Ticino, a Swiss village near the Italian border. “It isn’t only in Britain that spring this year has taken everyone by surprise. In Ticino, the slopes overlooking Lake Lugano have already burst into flower, at least a fortnight earlier than usual,” the outlet reported. To make it all look real, they actually collected visuals from the site showing an early springtime, juxtaposed with locals cultivating what appeared to be pasta. 

“But what has the early and welcome arrival of bees and blossoms got to do with food?” the British broadcaster asked its viewers. Turns out, the unusually mild past winter impacted the spaghetti 'harvest.' “It’s simply that the past winter has had its effects in other ways as well. Most importantly, it resulted in an exceptionally heavy spaghetti crop,” the voiceover explained in the background. While the visuals played, a giant tree with long, thin, and equally cut spaghetti could be seen falling off its branches. “The last two weeks of March are an anxious time for the spaghetti farmer,” it added. The report tried to falsely equate the then-prevalent frost problem with the made-up spaghetti cultivation, attempting to convince the audience.

However, the broadcaster was of the firm belief that these dangers were over and the spaghetti harvest would go forward. “Spaghetti cultivation here in Switzerland is not, of course, carried out on anything like the tremendous scale of the Italian industry,” it made another bizarre yet funny claim. More so, the footage concluded with pictures of what was called “the vast spaghetti plantations” in the Po Valley.

Additionally, the tale of a family in southern Switzerland harvesting spaghetti from the fictitious tree first appeared on BBC’s well-known current affairs program “Panorama.” Hundreds of viewers reportedly dialed the broadcaster at the time either to declare the news was false or to inquire about it. Some even asked how to cultivate their spaghetti trees. Meanwhile, the prank still invoked laughs among the online community, with scrollers like @RiverSpirit recalling that they first “watched it in class for history.” “I'm old enough to remember watching this. As the Psammead says, spaghetti was strange and exotic back in the '50s,” @Sunflowers159 added.

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