A 1938 radio drama frightened some listeners—and later reporting transformed their reaction into a much larger legend.
Fiction, news, and the legend that followed
On Sunday evening, October 30, 1938, CBS broadcast a dramatization of H. G. Wells's The War of the Worlds.
The Martians had been relocated from England to New Jersey.
The programme was fiction. It said so.
But much of its opening section was presented through simulated news bulletins and reports from supposed correspondents. Listeners arriving late—or simply not paying close attention—could encounter something that sounded considerably more like breaking news than a radio play.
Some believed it.
Then newspapers reported the reaction, and another story began growing: that the broadcast had thrown America into enormous nationwide panic.
That version also turned out to need editing.
Later research examined contemporary audience surveys and found that the actual listening audience was much smaller than the legend suggested. There really were frightened and confused listeners; what is doubtful is the familiar image of an entire nation collectively running from imaginary Martians.
So the evening produced two remarkable stories.
First, some people mistook fiction for news.
Then history mistook some frightened people for everybody.
Some listeners mistook fiction for news, and the later legend mistook some frightened listeners for an entire nation.
The Martians never reached New Jersey. The story about them made considerably better time.
Evidence status
Sources
Archival
American Archive of Public Broadcasting — The Mercury Theatre on the Air: War of the Worlds
Original language: EnglishInstitutional context
Original language: EnglishAuthoritative citation
Library of Congress National Recording Registry — War of the Worlds.
Original language: English