In this July 1925 file photo, Clarence Darrow, left, and William Jennings Bryan speak with each other during the monkey trial in Dayton, Tenn.
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In this July 1925 file photo, Clarence Darrow, left, and William Jennings Bryan speak with each other during the monkey trial in Dayton, Tenn.
AP
One hundred years ago, a substitute teacher in Dayton, Tenn., was charged with the crime of teaching Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution by natural selection. His name was John Scopes.
At the time, it was illegal in Tennessee to “teach any theory that denies the story of the Divine Creation of man as taught in the Bible, and to teach instead that man has descended from a lower order of animals.”
So, the small town Tennessee became the unlikely stage for one of the most sensational trials in American history: the Scopes “Monkey Trial.”
The trial, which was orchestrated to be a media spectacle, foreshadowed the cultural divisions that continue today and led to a backlash against proponents of evolution.
Read more of science correspondent Nell Greenfieldboyce’s reporting on the story.
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This episode was produced by Rachel Carlson and edited by Rebecca Ramirez. Tyler Jones and Nell Greenfieldboyce checked the facts. The audio engineer was Kwesi Lee.
