Use BBC.com or the new BBC App to listen to BBC podcasts, Radio 4 and the World Service outside the UK.

Find out how to listen to other BBC stations

Episode details

Sounds,26 Dec 2025,36 mins

Photographing Fairies (Classic)

Cautionary Tales with Tim Harford

Available for over a year

Sherlock Holmes is known for approaching all mysteries with cool logic - and yet when his creator Sir Arthur Conan Doyle saw photographs taken by two young girls purporting to show real life fairies at play... he unwisely declared them genuine. How did Elsie and Frances fool so many people with their photography... and why did they keep the hoax going for decade?

Programme Website
More episodes