The Burgess Shale Hoax was conceived and executed during the summer of 1909 by Charles Doolittle Walcott near the town of Field, British Columbia. Taking an extended vacation out of his home country and away from the hectic and competitive environment that comes with being the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, Walcott hatched an elaborate and brilliant plan to explain his absence. The plan worked, but too well, and would have drastic consequences for the pseudoscience of natural selection.