This page has paths:

1. 1 2019-12-18T18:41:11+00:00 Joelle Thomas 0feb3b2b7a8befeee2c7d2d710d303ed96772141 Cottingley Fairies: Gallery Joelle Thomas 11 very realism, much convincing gallery 2020-02-27T18:39:51+00:00 Joelle Thomas 0feb3b2b7a8befeee2c7d2d710d303ed96772141

This page is referenced by:

• 1 media/37753612-D16F-4D46-B70D-741FBA37E229.jpeg media/37753612-D16F-4D46-B70D-741FBA37E229.jpeg 2019-12-18T19:35:45+00:00 "I Have Convinced Myself": The Cottingley Fairies and the Desire to Believe 34 CF0 plain 2020-02-20T15:41:18+00:00
  In 1917, Francis Griffiths and Elsie Wright, nine and sixteen years old respectively, borrowed a camera from Elsie's father to provide proof that they saw fairies near Cottingley Beck. Elsie's father dismissed the two resulting photos as a prank; Elsie's mother, who developed an interest in Theosophy, brought the photos to the attention of her local Theosophical Society in 1919.
  
  The journey of these two photos, along with three subsequent ones, would become an international sensation, drawing in Spiritualists, skeptics, Kodak technicians, and one of the era's most famous writers.
  
  What motivated the creation of these images? And what made them so compelling that the British Journal of Photography would publish a ten-part exposé on them decades later, in 1983?
• 1 2020-02-20T15:55:22+00:00 Playing with the Fairies 6 CF1.1 plain 2020-02-21T19:55:55+00:00
  
  In 1917, Frances Griffiths and Elsie Wright, ten and sixteen years old respectively, were staying together in the Wrights' home in Cottingley Village, Yorkshire, after Frances and her mother had returned from South Africa. The girls were cousins and liked to play together in the narrow stream, referred to as a "beck," near their home. When Frances was scolded by her mother for getting her clothes wet and dirty in the beck, she claimed that she had fallen in the water while "playing with the fairies." The excuse did not go over well.
  
  The girls decided to provide evidence for Frances's claim, and a few days later Elsie asked her father, Arthur Wright, to lend them his camera for the day. After leaving school at the age of thirteen, Elsie had briefly attended a college of art, then taken a job with a local photography business, so Arthur had no qualms about entrusting her with his camera. Elsie and Francis returned with two photographic plates that they asked him to develop.
  
  While Elsie's father dismissed the two resulting photos as a prank, Elsie's mother, who developed an interest in Theosophy, brought the photos to the attention of her local Theosophical Society in 1919.
  
  
  
   
• 1 2020-02-28T20:03:25+00:00 Create Doubt 6 plain 2020-05-05T13:59:10+00:00 In all of these exhibits, there are central questions around what is actually true. When the media, experts, and the public debate these questions, the information becomes distorted, and doubt fills people's minds. Stakeholders deliberately sow misinformation, and sometimes declare a question unresolvable. 
  
  I. The Cottingley Fairy photographs drew doubt from all sides, including experts, which led the Manchester City News to essentially give up and write, "It seems at this point that we must either believe in the almost incredible mystery of the fairy or in the almost incredible wonders of faked photographs" (29 January 1921). 
  
  II. The Winsted Wild Man was described as a number of different creatures, each one more curious or alarming than the last. This constant redefinition of the Wild Man by townspeople and the media not only cast doubt as to its true existence, but helped keep the story alive, and selling newspapers. 
  
  III. Efforts to prevent, treat, or cure smallpox were characterized by frequent attempts to disinform the public and create doubt around various protocols. Anxiety around the disease itself inspired a range of reactions and misinformation that led to confusion and doubt.