'Giant fake goes back on display', Cardiff, 1987

Description

A newspaper clipping of the article 'Giant fake goes back on display', which discusses the creation of an exact copy of the 10ft 4in 'monster' found in Cardiff, New York, in the United States. The copy was created by Terry Chinn, and was on display at the Charles Street Arts Foundation's 11th carnival on 4 July 1987.

This clipping is part of a collection of papers and correspondence relating to 'The Cardiff Giant' and the plans of the Charles Street Arts Foundation to recreate the giant for their carnival.

Charles Street Arts Foundation was a voluntary organisation active in community arts in the centre of Cardiff, established in 1984. Its aim was to bring the arts and the community closer together, to a wider public outside the established institutions.

The Cardiff Giant was one of the most famous hoaxes in United States history. It was a 3-metre-tall purported "petrified man" uncovered on 16 October 1869, by workers digging a well behind the barn of William C 'Stub' Newell in Cardiff, New York. The giant was the creation of a New York tobacconist named George Hull. Hull, an atheist, decided to create the giant after an argument at a Methodist revival meeting about Genesis 6:4 stating that there were giants who once lived on Earth. It was revealed as fake in 1870 and is today on display at the Farmers’ Museum in Cooperstown, New York.


Ref: Glamorgan Archives, D20/4/1/2