The Secret of the Cottingley Fairies

Travel Guide

The Cottingley Fairies

Elsie Wright (1901–88) and Frances Griffiths (1907–86), were two young cousins who lived in Cottingley, near Bradford in England.

The first two photographs were taken in 1917 when Elsie was 16 years old and Frances was 9. There is a newspaper article here as to why the story still fascinates

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

The pictures came to the attention of writer Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, who, as a spiritualist was very keen to find out more. He hoped that the photographs would proof that a person’s thoughts could be captured on film and that fairy folk could be summonsed by believing in them.
Public reaction was mixed at first; whilst some accepted the images as genuine, others believed they had been faked. Interest in them wained after 1921 but the girls were traced again in the 1960s and Elsie still said that she believed she had photographed her thoughts.

It wasn’t until the early 1980s that Elsie and Frances admitted that the photographs were faked, but Frances maintained that the fifth and final photograph was in fact genuine.
The photographs and two of the cameras used are on display in the National Science and Media Museum in Bradford, England.