As indicated by Bob Knaus in the comments at MR, the story appeared in Jet Magazine in 1978. While this is not the most reliable source, the date explains an awful lot of your observations.
Note that the stories that copy the one Tyler links to are all in quick succession. The story did not spread continuously for two years, let alone thirty. It went into hibernation when someone clipped it out of the magazine thirty years ago and it went into hibernation shortly after that person uploaded it two years ago.
The heuristic that typesetting is authority is very easily gamed, but it works here.
It does explain a lot! Thanks! I knew it was good to be tentative in my judgement on the issue if this is a hoax or not. At least now there is a plausible reason why no other sources of this exist.
As indicated by Bob Knaus in the comments at MR, the story appeared in Jet Magazine in 1978. While this is not the most reliable source, the date explains an awful lot of your observations.
Note that the stories that copy the one Tyler links to are all in quick succession. The story did not spread continuously for two years, let alone thirty. It went into hibernation when someone clipped it out of the magazine thirty years ago and it went into hibernation shortly after that person uploaded it two years ago.
The heuristic that typesetting is authority is very easily gamed, but it works here.
It does explain a lot! Thanks! I knew it was good to be tentative in my judgement on the issue if this is a hoax or not. At least now there is a plausible reason why no other sources of this exist.