AFP Australia
Published on Monday
2 December 2019 at 03:50Updated on Wednesday
11 December 2019 at 10:48
A black and white photo has been shared tens of thousands of times in Twitter and Facebook posts which claim it is an image from 1899 showing Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg. The image has sparked an online furore, with many posts claiming it proved Thunberg was a time traveller, others saying it was doctored, and still more claiming it was evidence of reincarnation. But the black and white photo has actually been held in the archives of the University of Washington Libraries since the 1960s. UW said the image had not been doctored and was taken in Canada in 1898 by photographer Eric A. Hegg, who documented the Klondike gold rush. Thunberg was born in Sweden in 2003.