Alan C. Logan’s exhaustively researched and thoroughly documented book The Greatest Hoax on Earth: Catching Truth While We Can completely dispels the myths of the life of Frank Abagnale as popularised in the Leonardo DiCaprio and Tom Hanks film Catch Me If You Can. Presented in the 2002 Steven Spielberg movie as entirely fact-based, Abagnale’s duplicitous exploits as a pilot, doctor, and attorney, among other professions, before the age of 30 have gained an almost mythological status that began in the late 1970’s. Logan’s book seeks to set the record straight, but at the same time he provides a fascinating look at the media, how we decide what truth is, and what happens when we stop getting answers for ourselves.
For those unfamiliar with the story of Frank Abagnale, the film presents the story of a young man trying to make his father proud, and through only his own cleverness and ingenuity manages to become a pilot with Pan Am, work as a lawyer in the District Attorney’s office in Louisiana, and even serve as chief Resident in a hospital in Georgia, while always staying just one step ahead of the FBI. Well, almost always. Keep in mind, this is all happening while Abagnale is in his early-to-mid 20’s, with no college education. The real-life Frank Abagnale presents the story only slightly differently. His version also includes a stint as a professor at Brigham Young University.
The reality, as Alan Logan presents in his book, is that at the age of 28, Abagnale began telling the stories of his “adventures” in 1977 at Chamber of Commerce events in the Houston area, where he was living at the time. Logan’s book details how Abagnale took these small bits of publicity and made them grow, one newspaper article at a time. Looking through a lens of today it is stunning to see the total absence of research or fact-checking done. The fact that one article recounted his tales was proof enough for the next article to be written, and it quickly became a vicious cycle. Local events grew and grew until Abagnale was ultimately telling his tales on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson. What continued alongside his growth in popularity was the almost total lack of investigation into the truth of any of Abagnale’s claims.
Through meticulous steps, however, Logan is now righting that wrong. The Greatest Hoax on Earth goes step-by-step through the entirely made-up tales, the real victims of Abagnale’s scams, and the journalists who did actually do their research, and did try to inform people about the scam Abagnale was continuing to perpetuate by being paid to recount events that never happened in the first place.
It is impossible now to imagine a world where people would believe something just because it was said by someone on television (or is it?) And it is hard to imagine people just taking someone’s word about an event and not doing their own fact-checking (or is it?). Alan Logan’s book is an excellent depiction of how we have sometimes allowed the media to define what ‘truth’ is, and what our responsibility is to examine that truth and make sure there are facts available to back that up. Using the truth that Logan presents of Abagnale’s story, we are reminded that we need to be diligent in keeping ourselves informed and knowledgeable about the world around us.
The Greatest Hoax on Earth: Catching Truth While We Can is available from Amazon, Book Depository, and other good book retailers, like your local bookstore.
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Synopsis | Goodreads
When the truth is far stranger than fiction.
Award-winning author masterfully unmasks the myth of Frank “Catch Me If You Can” Abagnale with meticulous research and the voices of those who know the truth…and what a trip.
In 1969, Delta flight attendant Paula Parks discovers a strange man is following her. She is soon horrified to learn that he has moved into her parents’ home in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and is sleeping in her bed. Posing as a pilot, his ruse is quickly discovered, but not before he is caught stealing from her family and other locals. Startled by more revelations in letters written by the 21-year-old criminal from jail, Paula’s parents lock them away…never imagining where those letters would one day lead.
For decades, Frank W. Abagnale’s story has captured the imagination of audiences around the world as a modern-day folk hero-but the truth could not be more different from the fictitious autobiography he sold to Hollywood. Self-proclaimed as “the world’s greatest con man,” the true dimensions of Abagnale’s hoax are revealed for the first time in this dramatic true story.
A shocking new reality emerges through the voices of victims, their families, and others who have seen the truth concealed by decades of deception. Their stories are now exquisitely woven into a tapestry of hard evidence and insights from his former manager, Mark Zinder. The result is a fast-paced drama filled with heroes, villains, mystery and intrigue, answered with unquestionable facts and official records-all definitively disproving Abagnale’s longstanding claims of roaming the world as a “teenage millionaire imposter” and working for the District Attorney in Baton Rouge.
The Greatest Hoax reveals the very different world of a grown man still running small-time grifts in the mid-1970s-living in his parole officer’s garage after he was caught stealing from a Houston children’s camp. This makes his overnight rise to stardom all the more stunning. Selling fiction as fact, the con man found his greatest mark in global audiences. And the world bought it. In the inverted reality of the post-truth era, this book reveals that Frank W. Abagnale may have earned the mantle of “the world’s greatest con man” for entirely different reasons. It sets the scene for his return to Baton Rouge where comes face to face with Paula Parks, fifty years after he was arrested there.
The Greatest Hoax is a grand pursuit. With meticulous detail, it traces the strange-but-true movements of the enigmatic con man Frank W. Abagnale. With a remarkably diverse trail of forensic evidence-public records, witness statements, local reporting, stand-out journalism, and the con man’s own words-the jigsaw puzzle is assembled piece by piece. What an amazing picture it shows-but not at all compatible with his autobiography Catch Me if You Can or the films and musicals it spawned.
With the aid of facts and the words of those left in the con man’s wake, The Greatest Hoax unmasks the viral spread of a myth that escaped a “lab” in Houston, Texas, circa 1976. Far more than a debunking exercise, this true story is written with exquisite explanatory narrative, creating a parable of our times. The deep analysis within The Greatest Hoax is filled with suspense while also providing a meaningful wake-up call in the post-truth era.
