No, Shirley Temple Did Not Join Twitter

Earlier this weekend, pop culture buffs and the AARP set were all abuzz when word circulated that Shirley Temple, one of America’s most famous former child stars, had signed up for a Twitter account.

But 10,000 followers — and a couple tweets to Dick Van Dyke — later, it turns out that it was all a hoax.

The Prohibition Era star, known best for her curly hair, infectious smile and mad dance moves in films that now seem pedophilic in nature, spent her post-Hollywood years dabbling in Republican politics and serving on the boards for a lot of companies you’ve heard of. And after a 1972 breast cancer battle, she also became one of the first name-brand women to talk about the disease publicly.

On Friday, several media outlets reported the Twitter name @TempleShirleyJ was being manned by the now 84-year-old former actress. After thanking people for following her, she started the hashtag #askshirley and began answering questions from fans. Canadian supermodel Coco Rocha asked what she thought about Honey Boo Boo, and she replied she didn’t even know who that was, causing Rocha to later tweet:

I can’t believe I tweeted at Shirley Temple about Honey Boo Boo this morning. #Yolo

— CocoRocha (@cocorocha) January 25, 2013

Temple even exchanged a few tweets with TV legend Dick Van Dyke.

But alas, it was all a mirage. Several commenters on Gawker noted that once the account hit 10,000 followers, all those endearing tweets were wiped away and the hoaxster began pimping out a website (what it was, we’re not sure right now). Not long after, the @TempleShirleyJ account disappeared, and her reps said Temple was not on Twitter at all.

EXCLUSIVE:Representatives of Shirley Temple tell @dialmformovies that @templeshirleyj is not the Twitter account of Shirley Temple

— Rhett Bartlett (@dialmformovies) January 26, 2013

Sad trombone.

Guess if you’re looking for cute little old ladies on Twitter, you’ll just have to make do with @BettyMWhite for now.

Source: No, Shirley Temple Did Not Join Twitter