Admittedly inspired by Sports Illustrated’s famous Sidd Finch hoax of 1985, Sporting Classics magazine followed suit a dozen years later, reporting on the supposed catch of a world’s record largemouth bass in its March-April 1997 issue.
Editor Chuck Wechsler attributed at least part of the delay to technical difficulties. "I couldn't do it until we had technology to make a 13-pound, 4-ounce Florida bass look like a 22-pound, 7-ounce bass," he told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. The photo in question shows the magazine's circulation manager's dad, under an assumed name, proudly holding the fictitious fish.
Perhaps borrowing a page from professional con artists, who know to keep their claims reasonably plausible, the magazine's record bass was just 3 ounces over the previous recordholder. A 22-ton, 7-ounce bass, for example, would have been pushing it.
Not everyone was impressed, however. "One Ohio columnist said it was the single greatest breach of journalistic integrity he had ever witnessed," Wechsler told the Associated Press. "I wanted to tell him to get a life."
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