Origins of April Fools’ Day goes back to 1582 when France switched from the Julian calendar to the Gregorian calendar. In the Julian Calendar, the new year began with the spring equinox around April 1.
People who were slow to get the news or failed to recognize that the start of the new year had moved to January 1st and continued to celebrate New Years on April 1st. Thus, those individuals became the butt of jokes and hoaxes and were called “April fools.”
Nowadays, this day is known for the one day of the year you can pull pranks before noon and not get into trouble (or at least not as much).
People have gone to great lengths to create elaborate April Fools’ Day hoaxes. Even newspapers or radios sometimes join in on the April 1st tradition and report outrageous fictional claims that have fooled their audiences.
How do you feel about April Fools? Have you fooled someone so bad that they got upset at you because of it?
I was fortunately spared of April Fools pranks for most of my childhood, but my friend once got fooled by a lollipop her sister gave her on April 1st. She was young and naïve at the time and didn’t know that today was a day for pranking. Her sister put food coloring on the lollipop, so when she ate it, her teeth were turned all green. She was maybe 5 at the time so when she went to the mirror to wash her face, she realized that her teeth turned all green and believed that she was transforming into some kind of monster. Fortunately, her sister didn’t take the prank too far and jumped out laughing while spilling the beans on her joke.