Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee's play Inherit the Wind was probably more important, culturally, than the actual Scopes Trial it chronicles. The original 1925 “monkey” trial was actually a scam rigged by the town council of Dayton, Tennessee, as a desperate but successful attempt to pump some money into the town's failing economy. Scopes agreed to go on trial as part of the scam even though he had never actually discussed evolution in his class.

      - Mark