Eoörnis pterovelox gobiensis

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Eoörnis pterovelox gobiensis is a fictional bird created as a lighthearted hoax by Lester W. Sharp, a botany professor at Cornell University, with help from graduate student Cuthbert Fraser. It began as a short talk about the strangest bird from the Gobi Desert, called woofen-poof by locals. The idea grew into a 34-page mock monograph signed by a fake expert, Augustus C. Fotheringham, and printed in 1928 by The Buighleigh Press. The pages pretend to detail the bird’s anatomy, physiology, ecology, evolution, and history, and they even include Cro-Magnon cave paintings inspired by a pelican car mascot.

One quirky claim describes Pterovelox as often resting with its legs stretched straight behind it, its body held up by constant wing vibration. The spoof was printed and reprinted several times over the years.

Its odd mating notes even appeared in a 1934 eugenics article about cousin marriages, claiming the bird hatches twins, a male and a female, who later mate for life. Harriet Creighton later recalled Sharp reacting with disbelief while reading a review of Eoörnis, thinking the reviewer was joking until the end revealed the truth.

A 1967 review in the Journal of Paleontology by Frank C. Whitmore was praised in a tribute for the reviewer’s broad knowledge and gentle humor. The back cover of later editions said the work was a playful mockery of the famous Central Asiatic Expeditions led by Roy Chapman Andrews and the American Museum of Natural History.