Ah, you April fool!

Hone traced how the April fool’s street trick changed with fashion. Around 1795, when buckles were worn, a boy would tell a passer-by his shoe was unbuckled, and when he looked down cry out that he was an April fool; ten years later, when laces had replaced buckles, it was an untied shoe. By 1825, when shoes had neither, the joke was to say something was hanging out of a man’s pocket and name his hand, or to tell a lady she had something on her face, which turned out to be her nose.