National Enquirer Hoax & the Boing Boing Hoax
1994, New York, New York
The National Enquirer, after having read John Tierney's piece about Skaggs' Dog Meat Soup Hoax in The New York Times, wanted to do a profile on the artist. It wasn't the first time they had done a story on Skaggs. They had published articles in 1984 called "Clown Prince of Headlines" about the Cockroach Vitamin hoax and the Windsurfing hoax and another one called "Swank Fish Tank" about Fish Condos. And in 1986 they published an article called "Hoaxer Tricks U.S.News Giants With Phony Fat Squad Story - But He Couldnt Fool Enquirer" (with photos of Skaggs). But this was the first time they requested a special photo shoot. Skaggs was on vacation in Hawaii and tried to decline, believing they already had photos of him on file, but they were insistent. So they hired a local photographer to take his picture.
The photographer they hired was someone Skaggs knew. So Skaggs arranged with him to submit a photo of someone else. The someone else was a Skaggs friend from New York who was also on vacation in Hawaii. The photo shoot was a success with both Skaggs and friend posing in the exact same set-up for separate photos (this so there would be a photo of the real Skaggs after the article ran). They each wore a chefs hat and held a silver platter with a stuffed dog surrounded by vegetables in one hand. With their other hand they turned hot dogs on a barbecue grill.
When The Enquirer received the imposter photos, they called Skaggs to say they couldn't use them. and they wanted to reshoot. They felt the image would be offensive to their readers. They preferred to have him standing outside a chain link fence of a dog kennel. (That would be less offensive!) Skaggs was on his way back to New York and told them he was not available. The real reason was that his friend had stayed behind in Hawaii for a while.
But The Enquirer was persistent. They waited impatiently until Skaggs was available. When Skaggs' friend returned to New York, he agreed to do the second photo shoot at a photographer's loft in Manhattan. This photographer was also someone Skaggs knew. He had shot Skaggs previously for The Boston Globe as Dr. Chenango, the native American scalp transplant surgeon.
But, the second photo shoot went without a hitch as well. The photographer did not realize the person he was shooting was not Skaggs and he submitted his photos to The Enquirer.
The article ran shortly thereafter. The headline read "Americas #1 hoaxer makes headlines that fool millions. He's bamboozled newspapers & television stations (but hes never caught out The Enquirer)." The last paragraph said Skaggs admits there IS one publication hes never been able to dupe with his phony stories: "I havent gotten one past The Enquirer yet!"
Unfortunately for The Enquirer, they had never checked their own photo files to verify Skaggs' identity. They just couldnt believe that the same imposter could possibly be in Hawaii and in New York. Ooooops!
The magazine Boing Boing suffered a similar fate at the hands of Skaggs. They wrote an article for a regular column called "Nurse Freckles Prank Times" about the Dog Meat Soup hoax and requested a photo from Skaggs. He sent the photo of his friend mit mutt, which they printed without a second thought. Their last paragraph read, "Skaggs has been duping the mass media in this fashion for the last 28 years, fooling bigwigs like Good Morning America, Geraldo, CNN, and The New York Times. But he'll never fool Nurse Freckles! ...Ooooops again!