Joseph Boskin (August 10, 1929February 16, 2025) was professor of history and ethnic and urban studies at Boston University. His interests included American social history, popular culture, ethnicity, conflict and violence, and humor research.
Previous to joining Boston University in 1969, Boskin taught at Minnesota, Iowa, and The University of Southern California.
Other professional associations included Director, Institute on Law and Urban Studies, Los Angeles, 1970-1971 and Editorial board of the International Journal of Humor Research.
Boskin was born in Brooklyn, New York. He died in Lincoln, Massachusetts on February 16, 2025, at the age of 95.
Calling it his "Andy Warhol moment," in 1983, Boskin unwittingly fooled Fred Bayles, a reporter for the Associated Press by providing an "explanation" for the origins of April Fools' Day. After being pressed by Bayles during a phone interview, he invented the story that the practice originated in Emperor Constantine's period, when a group of court jesters jocularly told the emperor that jesters could do a better job of running the empire, and the amused emperor nominated a jester, Kugel, to be the king for a day. Boskin related how the jester passed an edict calling for absurdity on that day and the custom became an annual event. Boskin explained the jester's role as being able to put serious matters into perspective with humor. Bayles' story went out on the AP wire and was published up by newspapers across the United States on April 1, 1983.
The hoax came to light a few weeks later after Boskin recounted the story during a "Social Conflict in America" class, sharing that he was sure Bayles would realize he was joking when he told him the jester's name was Kugel, a kind of Jewish noodle pudding. Bill Swersey, a journalism student in the class, wrote the story for the university's student-run Daily Free Press newspaper, which published it on the front page on April 14, 1983. Ironically Bayles later joined the faculty at Boston University where Boskin was still teaching.