Bathtub hoax

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On December 28, 1917, an article by H. L. Mencken titled “A Neglected Anniversary” appeared in the New York Evening Mail. Menkin claimed that the actual anniversary of the first American bathtub, the alleged 75th, had gone unnoticed last week. This assumption was even though Washington, D.C.’s Public Health Service had made preparations for the events months in advance, which were eventually canceled by the city’s interventionist prohibition law.