 The problem was mentioned in works of period mathematicians, with solutions, mostly wrong, indicating that the problem was new and unfamiliar at the time.The device of marked objects (see Blue coconuts, below) to aid in conceptualizing the division with remainders first appeared in 1912 in the work of Norman H. Anning involving a bin of apples divided by three men.The problem became notorious when American novelist and short story writer Ben Ames Williams modified an older problem and included it in a story, "Coconuts", in the October 9, 1926 issue of The Saturday Evening Post.