Remember When Orson Welles’ ‘War of the Worlds’ Caused Mass Hysteria?
Long before the days of most television shows and movies, smartphones, and social media, there was the radio. For a long time, books and radio were two of the only options for entertainment at home. There were often special radio shows broadcast across the country, and one that perhaps caused the most confusion and mass hysteria was The War of the Worlds.
On Oct. 30, 1938, CBS Radio aired a dramatic interpretation of the 1898 novel of the same name by H.G. Wells in honor of Halloween. It was led by actor Orson Welles as part of the CBS series The Mercury Theatre on the Air. While the show did say several times that it was only a program and not real-life news, some Americans must have tuned in late because they believed there was an actual alien invasion happening.
An estimated 9 to 12 million Americans tuned in to the radio show, some switching over from the popular NBC Red Network’s Chase and Sanborn Hour. It was researched that some people believed there was an alien attack while others thought it could be a German attack or natural catastrophe because things were very tense at that time.
Everett Collection
Some who witnessed the event said that they saw people jumping from windows, running in the street, screaming or heading to local churches to pray about the end of times. Law enforcement said that the calls kept coming in, particularly in New Jersey or New York City, places mentioned in the story.
20th Century Fox Film Corp./Everett Collection
Recent research says that this hysteria was not as widespread as it seemed as the radio show as a whole received pretty low ratings. Even so, it seems certain that some people thought it was real, and it remains one of those iconic moments in American culture.
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