Ask The Science Experts

John Scopes was a high school biology teacher who was brought to trial in Dayton, Tennessee in 1925 for teaching the theory of evolution. He was protesting a state law that made teaching anything that denies the divine creation of man. The trial may be considered the first of what we would today call a media circus. Scopes was found guilty and sentenced with a very moderate fine but the decision was later reversed. The law remained on the books in Tennessee until 1967.

Jerome Lawrence wrote a Broadway play about the trial in 1955. The play, called Inherit the Wind was made into a movie in 1960 staring Spencer Tracy and Fredric March.

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