I used to work in the library of a Government research institute & heard & read some great stories about tricks & April Fool's jokes.

Our Director & another physicist (PHD's both of them & the Director was Australia's representative on an international commission!) once wrote a spurious paper & presented it at an international conference. He said everyone was talking BS & didn't know what they were talking about so they wrote it.

New Scientist once reported an April Fools joke perpetrated by folks at British institute of some kind - a press release for a new instrument - which was really a 12" wooden ruler. The joke continued as several years/ months? later a news agency asked about the news release, so they pointed out the date it was issued.

sandra