Knock Knock. Who’s There? 2,500 Raspberry Tarts

It’s been a tough day for Mrs. Tottenham. Photo illustration: Aida Amer (door: Public Domain)
Every day before April 1st, we tell the story of a ridiculous historical prank. You can find more here.
Imagine this: All the spam Emails you’ve ever received have come to life and your doorbell is ringing one by one. There, on your stairs, is a parade of products you never asked for. Dozens of providers of services you don’t need are knocking on your window. And look when you come up the driveway – is that a Nigerian prince?
Several centuries before the Internet, playwright Theodore Hook essentially invented the spam campaign. On November 27, 1810, Hook sent hundreds of merchants, tons of goods and at least one royal figure to the same sleepy apartment at 54 Berners Street, London.
It is unclear what exactly motivated Hook. Some say that a friend dared him to make Berner Strasse 54 the most famous address in town. Others say the resident of the apartment, a Mrs. Tottenham, pissed him off somehow. It’s also possible that he just did it for laughter. As a friend of his once remarked: “The exuberance of his fun was irrepressible … [them]. ”A common hobby of those involved was going to parties he wasn’t invited to – although the hosts always found him out, he generally kept everyone so entertained that they didn’t mind.
The villainous Theodore Hook. Public domain
For this trick, however, he decided to take things even further. According to The Life and Remains of Theodore Hook – a book put together by biographer Richard Bentley from Hook’s own writings – he and two friends spent six weeks writing invitations and “asking recipients to call on a specific day No. 54, Berner ”. -Street. “When the day came, as the biography attests, they had sent out” about four thousand letters, “each with tight references, specific directions and, if necessary, a dash of intrigue. (It’s hard to resist an invitation from anyone who writes that he is “eager to talk about important matters.”)
When the big day came, Hook and his friends posted themselves at a hotel on Berners Street, just across from 54. Newspapers give us an idea of what they saw. The first reportedly was a lone chimney sweep who showed up at 5 a.m. sharp. About a dozen more soon followed. All morning and afternoon it was teeming with all sorts of callers whose visits under normal circumstances were mutually exclusive: undertaker and companion; Opticians and dentists; Coal wagons and wedding cakes; and carts with “bedding, jewelry, and any other description of furniture enough to fill the whole street.”
A cartoon based on the Berners Street Hoax. One of the confused victims promises to find the perpetrator “with a hook or a crook”. William Heath / Public Domain
Six stocky men provided an organ. Forty butchers came with 40 legs of mutton. Then the Mayor of London sped around the corner himself in his carriage. He had received a personal letter from Mrs. Tottenham, he told him that she was too sick to come to their scheduled meeting and asked if he could come over to see her instead.
Hook’s biography shows even more visitors – lawyers, clergymen, even the Duke of Gloucester. In any case, the streets between the confused merchants and the curious onlookers were soon clogged to the point of impassability. Even the police couldn’t do anything. It was, according to Jackson’s Oxford Journal, “the greatest scam ever heard of in this metropolis,” and if the perpetrator was ever found, they should be punished for “such a despicable wager”.
Although Hook was never officially caught, much of London suspected him. Even before his posthumous autobiography, Hook confessed to the joke, so to speak: In his play Gilbert Gurney, he makes the main character enjoy the confession. “What else has the effect on Berners Street? I am the man, ”he says. “[I sent] Dozens of pianofortes and dozens of coal wagons … two thousand five hundred raspberry tarts from half a hundred pastry chefs … even the royalty itself. “I’m sure Mrs. Tottenham has never met him again.