Timesuck with Dan Cummins - Short Suck #18 - The War of the Worlds

Episode Date: September 27, 2024

On the evening of October 30th, 1938, the CBS Radio Network broadcasted Orson Welles's live adaptation of the 1897 HG Wells classic, groundbreaking sci-fi novel, The War of the Worlds, all across America. And those who paid close attention knew it was fiction. But thousands and thousands of others who didn't... literally thought the US was currently being invaded and attacked by hostile, killer aliens from Mars and fellow citizens were dying in droves. They panicked and true pandemonium ensued! For Merch and everything else Bad Magic related, head to: https://www.badmagicproductions.com

Welcome to this edition of Time Sucks, Short Sucks. I'm Dan Cummins. Today I will be talking about the day the Martians invaded Earth. Or more accurately, the day a lot of people thought that Martians, hostile Martians no less, truly invaded Earth and some pandemonium ensued. On the evening of October 30, 1938, the CBS Radio Network broadcasted a live adaptation of the 1897 H.G. Wells classic groundbreaking sci-fi novel, The War of the Worlds. Though some folks tuned in that night and knew what they were listening to, they knew

it was pure theater and fiction, others, thousands and thousands of others, did not. They didn't think they were listening to a dramatic telling of a fictional work. They thought they were listening to honest-to-god news coverage of a large-scale extraterrestrial attack. And they couldn't hop on the internet or check Facebook to find out what the truth was or to see if anyone else was freaking out. No, they just panicked and prepared to fight hide or die. When these listeners heard breaking news bulletins about New Jersey being overrun with seemingly invincible hyper-intelligent blood-sucking laser gun wielding aliens, they freaked the fuck out. It was maybe the best accidental practical joke of all time.

If it was indeed an accident. The morning after it aired, the director and narrator of the program, Orson Welles, awoke to discover he was the most hated man in all of America. Newspapers around the nation were flooded with reports of mass hysteria, stampeds, theft, suicides, even murders, all committed by those who had believed the radio broadcast was real and that humanity had finally met its inescapable and horrific end. Today we will examine not only this fascinating moment in time, but also ask the question, did Orson Welles want to create mass hysteria?

Words and ideas can change the world. I hated her, but I wanted to love my mother. I have a dream. I plead not guilty right now. Your only chance is to leave with us. All right. Let's begin our examination of the infamous The War of the World radio broadcast. Who recorded it?

Who believed it? Why would they believe it? And was the chaos and panic it caused unanticipated and unintentional, or part of the plan all along? Ladies and gentlemen, I have a grave announcement to make. Incredible as it may seem, both the observations of science and the evidence of our eyes lead to the inescapable assumption that those strange beings who landed in the Jersey farmlands tonight are the vanguard of an invading army from the planet Mars.

The battle which took place tonight at Grove of Mills has ended in one of the most startling defeats ever suffered by an army in modern times. Seven thousand men armed with rifles and machine guns pitted against a single fighting machine of the invaders from Mars. Oh my God. One hundred and twenty known survivors. The rest strewn over the battle area from Grover's Mill to Plainsboro, crushed and trampled to death under the metal feet of the monster, or burned to cinders by its heat ray.

The monster is now in control of the middle section of New Jersey and has effectively cut the state through its center. Communication lines are down from Pennsylvania to the Atlantic Ocean. Railroad tracks are torn and service from New York to Philadelphia discontinued except rooting some of the trains through Allerton and Phoenixville. Highways to the north, south and west are clogged with frantic human traffic. Police and army reserves are unable to control the mad flag. By morning the fugitives will have swelled Philadelphia, Camden and Trenton.

It is estimated to twice their normal population. Martial law prevailed throughout New Jersey and Eastern Pennsylvania. My God! That is what people all across America, they heard on a, they were told on a national radio broadcast on October 30th, 1938, that an extraterrestrial vessel had crash landed in New Jersey and from it an army of aliens were descending upon the stage armed with some some fucking heat rays that had already incinerated approximately 8,000 victims. Like I said in the intro many people listening to the radio that evening were delighted by the news of the alien invasion because they knew it was all made up. It was a very well done dramatic telling of this novel.

They heard the very beginning of the program when it was announced that it was a theatrical presentation of The War of the Worlds by H.G. Wells, a fiction author. But others missed that part and started shitting their pants. The broadcast that terrified the nation began the night before Halloween at 8 p.m. Eastern time from a small recording studio at the CBS headquarters in New York City, Dan Seymour kicked off the live show with an announcement. The Columbia Broadcasting System and its affiliated stations present Orson Welles and the Mercury Theatre on the air in The War of the Worlds by H.G. Wells. At the time Orson Welles, no relation to the author H.G. Wells, was 23 years old and crushing

it in the world of theater. He was a prodigy. After a few years of directing high-profile plays in New York City, including an adaptation of Macbeth with an all-black cast, in 1936, 21-year-old Orson, so young, founded his own independent theater company called the Mercury Theater. And under Orson's command, the Mercury Theater performed multiple productions on Broadway from 1936 to 1941, its final year coinciding with the release of Orson's first feature film, you may have heard of it, Citizen Kane, which he both wrote and directed, a film that failed commercially at the time but now is considered one of the best most important films literally ever made. But before that, in 1938 Orson decided

to bring his theater company to the radio. At the time, entertainment radio was still a very novel invention, just on the cusp of becoming a definitive pillar of modern American life. From July 11th, 1938 to December 4th, 1938, Orson directed and starred in the limited series, The Mercury Theater on the Air.

Each week week the cast performed a live adaptation of a different literary classic, some of which included Dracula by Bram Stoker, Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson, A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens, Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte, Around the World in 80 Days by Jules Verne and of course The War of the Worlds by H.G. Wells. I know I already said it, but I feel the need to say it again because it's confusing. Even though they share the same last name. Slightly different spelling though. No relation between Orson Welles the director and H.G. Wells the author.

Okay, now before we get into the War of the Worlds broadcast and its cataclysmic fallout, it's so fucking good. Let's take a quick look at the book that inspired it. The War of the Worlds was written in 1897 by Herbert George Wells. I see why he went by HG. Sorry, sorry, Herbert's out there. It was released in full as a novel. Before that, it was first published in America in weekly installments by Cosmopolitan magazine. Yeah, Cosmo.

Pretty funny, right? Long before they were printing articles on stuff like sex moves to blow his mind in bed, or what Emma Roberts' skincare regimen is, or must-have fall fashion accessories for 2024. They were published in stuff like sci-fi. They've been around since 1886, been based in New York City the whole time, and they've adapted their focus just slightly over the years. Anyway, H.G. Wells' story is told through the eyes of an unnamed male narrator as he struggles to based in New York City the whole time and they've adapted their focus just slightly over the years.

Anyway, H.G. Wells' story is told through the eyes of an unnamed male narrator as he struggles to find his family during an alien invasion in the UK. The novel begins with a falling star that lands in a nature preserve near where the narrator lives in Woking, England, beautiful town just over 20 miles from the center of London. The narrator visits the crash site which has drawn a small of locals, and discovers what the news said was a meteor is actually a large metal cylinder. And then suddenly, the cylinder opens. I think everyone expected to see a man emerge, possibly something a little unlike us terrestrial men. But in all essentials a man. I know I did, says the narrator.

But instead of a humanoid creature, what crawls out of the extraterrestrial vessel is more like an octopus. Like tentacles, slithering, viscid, like some sort of Lovecraftian cosmic horror creature. But this novel was written when H.P. Lovecraft was still in grade school. The Martians in The War of the Worlds do not have bodies. They have gigantic round heads with two damp eyes and a beak-like mouth that drips with saliva. From around the mouth, if you can call it that, eight long tentacles gleaming like wet leather protrude and wriggle around. The narrator continues his description of the alien saying, Those who have never seen a living Martian can scarcely imagine the strange horror of its appearance.

There was something fungoid in the oily brown skin, something in the clumsy deliberation of the tedious movements I can't quite f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f*****g f** in the nearby woods from his hiding spot, watches a small group of men approach the cylinder waving a white flag and they are immediately incinerated. Yeah, that bodiless head can fuck you up, buddy. Who needs a body when you got alien robotic armor and incredibly advanced weapon tech armed with their heat ray, laser rocket type of thing, and other super-powered weaponry. The Martians then began to calmly and methodically invade Earth and butcher just about every human they encounter.

As they go on their rampage, it becomes clear they're a profoundly superior species and that humans to Martians are like insects to us. Inconsequential. Lesser in every way. However, humans do have one thing Martians don't. Our immune systems have evolved to protect us from the Earth's indigenous disease bacteria. The Martians do not share this immunity. So in the end, it is bacteria, some of the smallest, most insignificant organisms in the world, that defeat the Martians.

15 days after they land on Earth, every single one of the alien invaders is dead from the common cold. As soon as the War of the Worlds came out, both British and American audiences went fucking nuts for it. Which makes sense. The book is completely action packed. The premise is terrifying and was super novel, super unique when it was published. And the characters are very compelling. There had literally never been anything quite like it. Its originality cannot be overstated.

What made the book such a massive success in the late 1800s was the fact that no one had read anything like it ever before. The War of the Worlds was the first book about alien invasion that humanity had ever come across. Hard to imagine that nowadays because we're so inundated with the trope, you know? But back then, the concept of going to war with an extra-terrestrial fucking Independence Day,

let's go, right? This extra-terrestrial race, completely and utterly novel. Sci-fi literally didn't really exist before H.G. Wells, which is why he rightly shares the nickname the father of science fiction along with Jules Verne and Hugo Gernsback. Frankenstein author Mary Shelley is also credited with being one of a handful of authors and publishers who invented and established a genre. So it's not like no one had written anything, anything at all like, but specifically like alien sci-fi was new, right like Inception alien body snatchers back to the future

Interstellar there's so many good movies district 9 arrival Blade Runner 2001 a space odyssey The Matrix X Mahina Dune Star Wars even ET they wouldn't exist if it had not been for HG Wells and a handful of others Before he was an author, Wells was actually a scientist. He studied biology at what is now called the Royal College of Science under none other than T.H. Huxley, the accomplished biologist who earned the nickname Darwin's Bulldog for his outspoken support of Charles Darwin's theory of evolution. At 29 years old, Earl Herbert wrote his debut novel, The Time Machine,

in which he both invented the terms time machine and time traveler, as well as incorporated what he knew about evolution, biology, and genetics to imagine what the distant future of human anatomy and behavior might look like. If you've read the book or seen the movie, you know that Wells thought things probably wouldn't turn out so good for our species. Throughout all of his work, H.G. Wells continued to rely on his background as a biologist in order to create pieces of fiction that were rooted in scientific reality, hence the merging of science and fiction. Amazing Stories editor Hugo Gernsback will later be credited for coining the term science fiction, what we now consider to be many of the pillars of sci-fi, things like space exploration, rampant and

scientific advancement, intergalactic war, alien invasion, biological engineering, hyper-weaponized futures, all first introduced by H.G. Wells, or he was close to being the first to introduce them. While writing about the future, H.G. Wells also ended up accurately predicting a lot of what would come. Or at least, a lot of what humanity would begin to worry was to come. For example, in his 1913 fiction novel, The World Set Free, Wells wrote about the apocalypse being caused by the invention of nuclear-powered weapons, specifically the atomic bomb. It's like

crazy. He even wrote about how upon detonation the atomic bomb produced a mushroom cloud and toxic radiation in its wake. Doing this way ahead of when these things were actually happening. The atomic bomb invented three decades later. Long before they became a reality, H.G. Wells wrote about cell phones, voicemail, military tanks, genetic engineering, automatic doors, audiobooks, he was a visionary like Leonardo da Vinci, just a crazy mind. But most shockingly in his 1933 book The Shape of Things to Come, Wells described a fictional war to end all wars that begins in January of 1940 and is incited by a conflict between Germany and Poland.

As we know in September of 1939 Germany would invade Poland and World War II would begin. Okay so now we know a bit more about the author who inspired all this. Let's get back to the infamous War of the World's radio broadcast. For the Halloween episode of the Mercury Theatre on air, the other wells, Orson, well he wanted to try something new. He didn't want to just adapt a novel into a play that was fit for the radio. He wanted to adapt a novel into radio itself. In a 1960 court deposition he stated, I conceived the idea of doing a radio broadcast in such a manner that a crisis would actually seem to be happening and would be broadcast in such a dramatized form as to appear to be a real event taking place at

the time rather than a mere radio play. Well, mission accomplished buddy. Alongside his producer John Houseman and his co-director Paul Stewart Orson set about converting the war of the world into for lack of a better phrase, fake news. The broadcast, which you can listen to in its entirety on YouTube, begins with Orson, or you can go to wellsnet.com and then they have audio, all kinds of Orson Welles audio on there, these full broadcasts, begins with Orson reciting a slightly altered version of the novel's opening paragraph. We know now that in the early years of the twentieth century this world was being watched closely by intelligences greater than man's and yet as mortal as his own.

We know now that as human beings busied themselves about their various concerns they were scrutinized and studied, perhaps almost as narrowly as a man with a microscope might scrutinize the transient creatures that swarm and multiply in a drop of water. With infinite complacence, people went to and fro over the earth about their little affairs, serene in the assurance of their dominion over this small spinning fragment of solar driftwood which by chance or design man has inherited out of the dark mystery of time and space. Yet across an immense ethereal gulf, minds that are to our minds as ours are to the beasts in the jungle, intellects vast, cool, and unsympathetic, regarded this earth with envious eyes, and slowly and surely drew their plans against us. In the thirty-ninth year of

the twentieth century came the great disillusionment. Near the end of October, business was better, the war scare was over, more men were back at work, sales were picking up. On this particular evening, October 30th, the Crossley service estimated that 32 million people were listening in on radios. When Orson finishes this opening monologue, announcer number one's voice fades in, in a haughty transatlantic accent. He gives the day's forecast from the government weather bureau, then states, we now take you to the marooning room in the Hotel Park Plaza in downtown New York where you'll be entertained by the music of Ramon Riquello and his orchestra. And then, and I think this is fucking brilliant, for the next three minutes the Mercury Theater's orchestra

just plays live from inside the CBS studio. How many thousands of people tuned in a bit late and just heard some music playing, right, before what sounded like all hell breaking loose. The music is cut off by the first fake news bulletin that sounds exactly like a real news bulletin would have at the time. In an equally haughty and transatlantic voice, announcer number two tells listeners that he's interrupting the dance music program to bring them a special bulletin from Intercontinental Radio News. He shares that just 20 minutes earlier,

a report came in from an astronomer at Mount Jennings Observatory in Chicago that he had observed, quote, "'Several explosions of incandescent gas occurring at regular intervals on the planet Mars. The spectroscope indicates the gas to be hydrogen and moving towards the Earth with enormous velocity. Professor Pearson of the Observatory at Princeton confirms Farrell's observation and describes the phenomenon as quote, like a jet of blue flame shot from a gun, end quote.

We now return you to the music of Ramon Raquello, playing for you in the Meridian Room of the Park Plaza Hotel situated in downtown New York. And then the orchestra just starts playing again. I fucking love it. Oh my god, the addition of the orchestra to chef's kiss. Oh, such a good touch. Makes it seem so real. Just brilliant. Imagine hearing that some shit just got launched on the surface of Mars. Hearing it back when people truly did wonder if a race of advanced extraterrestrials were living on Mars. And then it just cuts to some fucking swing music. They knew they would be building so much tension, so much anxiety for the listeners. While the music plays, heated discussions are breaking out all around America.

Dad, what are they talking about? What do you think just happened on Mars? I don't know, Johnny. I'm sure it's nothing. Probably just random gas exploding or something. Meanwhile Johnny's dad is really thinking, oh fuck, oh God, don't panic, don't let the boy see you panic, this is it, the Martians are coming, oh god, we're all gonna die. After another few minutes of live music, the second bulletin comes in.

Announce number two now declares the station has arranged an interview with Professor Pearson at Princeton University's Observatory in New Jersey. During this interview, journalist Carl Phillips, voiced by actor Frank Reddick, asked Professor Pearson, voiced by Orson Welles, what the astronomer thinks about the gas eruptions on Mars. Pearson responds that he cannot account for them, but he knows indisputably it cannot be due to any intelligent force, because as we know, there is no life on Mars. Phew! Oh, big wave of relief for the listening audience at home. See, Johnny, I told you, son.

Nothing to worry about. Now Johnny's dad is thinking, what's this gas, you idiot? You're about to freak out. Scare the boy. Don't be such a fool. But then, Professor Pearson receives notice of a strange meteorite that has crashed 20 miles from Princeton in Grovers Mill, New Jersey. When the two men leave to go check it out.

Now Johnny and his dad are both anxious as shit again. Broadcast now returns to the New York studio and once again audiences are invited to listen to some live dance music till further updates can be given. Now just building more tension, baby. Build more suspense. Few minutes later, the music abruptly ends.

Listeners are brought to the farm in Grovers Mill, New Jersey where Phillips and Professor Pearson are now reporting from the crash site. Yeah, they did drive incredibly fast to get there. Over a pretty convincing cacophony of what sounds like a small crowd outside and some police sirens, Phillips describes the chaos unfolding around the extraterrestrial mass. He reports that the thing that fell from the sky does not look at all like a meteorite, but appears more like a metal vessel.

Oh shit. Oh, Johnny's terrified now. He's looking to his dad to see how scared he is. Johnny's dad's trying to play it cool, but his heart fucking pounding faster and faster. A little trickle of sweat running down the crack of his ass. Oh please God, don't let the aliens be powerful killers. According to the Smithsonian, to prepare for this role, Frank Reddick, the actor playing Carl Phillips, listened to a recording of the live Hindenburg disaster radio broadcast

Let's listen to it on repeat in order to emulate the reporters cadence and tone as he watched this horrific Tragedy unfold before his eyes. Yeah, it all sounds very real now Let's listen to the moment in the broadcast who in the alien spaceship first opens up and the Martians make their big debut. Just leave the... Yeah, let's listen to this right now. Okay, here we go. Hello. Move it! Get back there! Get back there! Hey, keep the train back! Keep the train back! Keep those idiots back! Come on! Ladies!

The trombones! Ladies and gentlemen, this is the most terrifying thing I've ever witnessed. Wickedness! Something I conceived. It came out of that black hole through luminous discs. In the eyes, this might be a face. It might be on the roof of heaven. Something rigged out of the shadow like a gray snake.

I've got it. Now it's another one of those things. I've got it. I've got it. I've got it. I've got it. I've got it. I've got it. I've got it. I've got it. black hole through luminous discs. In the eyes, this might be a face, might be almost like heaven, something out of a shadow like a grey snake. Now it's another one, and another one, and another one.

They look like tentacles to me. I can see the thing's body, now it's large, and as large as a bear. It's different, it's like wet leather. That's hate, ladies and gentlemen, to describe it. I can hardly force myself to keep looking at it. It's awful, the eyes are black and they gleam like a serpent in the mountains. That's kind of V-shaped, like saliva dripping from its rimless lips.

It's a shade of quivered pulsate. The monster of whatever it is can hardly move. It's weighed down by fear. You're gonna lose your mind. Possibly gravity or something. The thing's rising up now and the crowd falls back. There's not even much to start your experience with until you like, they find words and, well, I'll pull this microphone with me as I talk. I have to experience, but he's like, they find words.

Well, I pull this microphone with me. If they talk, I've stopped the description until I can take a new position. Hold on. What are you? Please? I'll be right back in a minute. Just leaving everybody hanging a little more, a little more music from the Rodeo room with the park Plaza hotel. Johnny's got to be near tears now.

His dad's thinking about what ammo he has for his guns, if he should buy more. He's wondering if they should get in the car, drive out to the woods, try and hide her, you know, out in the woods or maybe hunker down in the basement. You know, he's taking Johnny's mom aside and just telling her that, you know, he's got to go around grab a bunch of canned box food, long shelf life, so he can hide inside for an extended period of time. I mean, think about if you were around in 1938. You happen to catch this news bulletin

while flipping through the radio channels or just turning your radio on. I mean, would you think it's real? Or would you automatically assume it's some sort of prank? I mean, I doubt you probably would think it was a prank because people weren't doing pranks like that back then. And remember, at this point in time, the only way to get up-to-date information about current events

was through the radio or the newspaper. And the next newspaper right is hours and hours away, next morning. The first regularly scheduled news broadcast on American television won't air for a year and a half, not until March 1940. These poor bastards are over half a century away from being able to Google, are the Martians invading right now? Or like, what the fuck is going on in New Jersey? No one has a cell phone to text all their friends to see if any of them know what's happening You can use a landline if you have one but you know the few people you know don't know anything either Then you know your shit out of luck

There's not a ton of landlines the population the US in 1938 roughly 130 million Only about 20 million phones so a lot of families don't have a phone 20 million phones so a lot of families don't have a phone. Eventually the broadcast returns to Carl Phillips reporting live as the Martians attack with their heat ray for the first time. And before I share another snippet of Orson's original broadcasts, time for today's mid-show sponsor break. If you don't want to hear these ads you can sign up for on our patreon, become a space lizard for five dollars a month get the entire catalog ad free and hundred-thousands of hours of extra content

And I'm back and it's time to hear the part of Orson's broadcast when the Martians start to kill with their heat ray We are bringing you an eyewitness account of what's happening on the Wilmeth farm Groversville New Jersey. Uh oh. I love... I love music. Everyone's like, come on, come on, what's going on there? Come on! What the hell? We now return you to Carl Phillips at Grovers Mill. Ladies and gentlemen... am I on? Ladies and gentlemen, ladies and gentlemen, here I am, back of a stone wall that ad mr. Wilma's garden from here I get a sweep of the whole thing I'll give you every detail as long as I can talk and as long as I can say

More state police have arrived and throwing up a pardon in front of the pit about 30 of them No need to push the crowd back now. They're willing to keep their distance the captain Preferring with someone can't quite see who I asked I believe it's professor Pearson yes it is now now they've parted and the professor moves around one side studying the object while it's captain and two policemen advanced with something in their hands I can see it now it's a white head tip tied to a pole flag of troops those creatures know what that means but anything means something's happening. Uh oh. Hump shakers rising out of the pit. They've got a small beam of light against the mirror.

There's a jet of flame springing from the mirror and it leaps right at the advancing men. He strikes them head on. The odds are turning in a plane. The wood surprise. There's gas, gas, gas in the automobiles. It's spreading everywhere. Coming this way now, about 20 yards to my right. And just cuts off.

Oh my God. Johnny is running around the house just screaming right now. Johnny's dad rushing over to the store for dry goods and ammo. Johnny's mom just crying, setting up in the basement, you know, so it can be a place where they won't need to leave for a few months. The fake news bullets on the broadcast now cuts to a supposed message from the Secretary of the Interior who urges all Americans to remain calm and collected in spite of this dire attack and emphasizes the importance of preserving human supremacy on Earth.

As the broadcast continues, listeners are informed that New York and Virginia are now also being invaded. There's multiple ships and that in addition to the heat rays, the Martian's infantry also have some kind of lethal black smoke that our gas masks are completely useless against. At one point, announcer number one reports from the top of the broadcasting building in New York City as the metropolis is fucking decimated before his very eyes. In the background, the distant sound of church bells, screaming, sirens, and explosions are ringing ringing out the announcer states that the poisonous black smoke is getting closer and closer to a spot on the roof and to the bulletin ends with the dull

sound of his body falling onto the floor just over 30 minutes into this broadcast holy shit they went balls to the walls on this one just over 35 minutes into the 51 plus minute, the audience is reminded that this is a dramatic presentation of a book. And then there's another roughly 15 minutes of insanity, then Orson closes out the program with This is Orson Welles, ladies and gentlemen, out of character to assure you that the War of the Worlds has no further significance than as the holiday offering it was intended

to be, the Mercury Theatre's own radio version of dressing up in a sheet and jumping out of a bush and saying boo. Starting now we couldn't soap all your windows and steal all your garden gates by tomorrow night, so we did the best next thing. We annihilated the world before your very ears and utterly destroyed the CBS. You will be relieved, I hope, to learn that we didn't mean it, and that both institutions are still open for business. So goodbye, everybody, and remember the terrible lesson you learned tonight. That grinning, glowing, globular invader of your living room is an inhabitant of the pumpkin patch, and if your doorbell rings and nobody's there, that was no Martian. It's Halloween. Next morning, Monday, October 31st, the front page of the New York Times reads,

Radio listeners in panic taking war drama is fact. It's stated that upon hearing the live broadcast, thousands began to evacuate New York City and New Jersey to escape the Martians, which in turn caused tremendous bumper-to-bumper traffic jams and multiple accidents. On one block in Newark, I love this so much, at least 20 different families fled their homes just on this one block. All at once carrying a few precious belongings and holding wet towels over their faces to protect themselves from the extraterrestrials poisonous black smoke. Oh my god, I would be down on the floor with laughter if I was Orson Welles reading that. Holy shit I'd be so fucking proud of myself. At least 20 families on one block fleeing in terror. How pissed were they when they found out it was all bullshit? It felt like idiots. And how hard are you

laughing if you also lived on that block but had paid attention to the whole thing and knew it was a joke and now you're just like, oh look at Mrs. Smolinski go. Man, she can still move fast for being almost 80 years old. That is fantastic. Article also claimed that at the time of publication a score of adults required medical treatment for shock and hysteria. In New York City alone, within a single hour since the broadcast started, the police received thousands of phone calls from terrified citizens frantically inquiring if the broadcast was real, requesting assistance, evacuating their loved ones, and asking where they should go to seek shelter, seek refuge from alien bombs, a heat ray and the poisonous gas raid. The influx of phone calls severely impacted the police's ability to attend to real emergencies happening in the city.

One patrolman named John Morrison was on duty working the switchboard at the Bronx police headquarters when the broadcast and the panic began. The first of the hundreds of phone calls he received that evening was from a terrified citizen who screamed at him through the phone, They're bombing New Jersey! Morrison asked, How do you know? To which the caller responded, I heard it on the radio, then I went to the roof and I could see the smoke from the bombs drifting over towards New York. What should I do? The New York Times headquarters was also bombarded with phone calls about the broadcast. 875 to be exact. One man from Dayton, Ohio asked, At what time will it be the end of the world? Like in all seriousness.

And I gotta say that's a super weird way to phrase that question. It's also just a super weird question to ask. How would anyone work in there? Know exactly when these aliens who just landed will be finished destroying everything. And why the fuck would you stay at work answering the phone if you knew the end of the world was imminent? I love my job. I truly do.

But if I know the world is going to be ending in the next few hours or days, guess who no longer gives a shit about podcasting? Get the fuck out of here. I'm going to have a big end of the world party, spend as much time as I got left with Lindsay and the kids, the dogs, and I don't know, maybe do a lot of drugs. In Harlem, multiple churches' evening services were interrupted by terrified parishioners barging through the doors seeking spiritual consolation and guidance from the heavens on how to navigate a Martian invasion. These evening services morphed into end-of-the-world prayer meetings with everyone crowded inside the ground floor of a brownstone house You know praying crying wailing preparing to meet their maker

Similar situations were reported in churches across Alabama, Tennessee and Indiana reportedly one Indianapolis woman ran into st. Paul's Episcopal Church a church she did not attend by the way Screaming New York is destroyed. It's the end of the world! You might as well go home to die! I just heard it on the radio! In less than an hour, Orson Welles pranked more people than the cast of Punk'd, The Impractical Jokers, and every other prank show that's ever been combined. A hospital in Newark received phone calls from multiple parents whose children were receiving treatment there, demanding their child be discharged so they could evacuate the city with their family. Similarly another newspaper reported that a patient at a hospital in

Macon, Georgia who had just received an operation tore his surgical stitches loose and bolted from his bed upon hearing the fake news. Oh my god. According to the New York Times and other sources part of the reason the panic became so widespread was actually something good. It was because people were just really looking out for each other. One terrified listener would call his mom who would tell her neighbors, who would tell their friends, who would then tell everybody who listened that they needed to evacuate right now. The streets of New York were flooded with people fleeing their homes to escape the end of the world and the majority of them probably never heard the broadcast. Although the Mercury Theater on air did have a dedicated following,

it wasn't massively popular amongst the masses. There were many other radio shows, far more popular. So it was more by word of mouth that the hysteria spread. The potent work of the rumor mill and mob mentality. Upon hearing the news that the East Coast was being invaded by extraterrestrials, one woman from New Orleans immediately got on a flight to New York City to go save her daughter who was going to a university there. The article doesn't say but I wonder what her reaction was when she landed at JFK and there were no Martians anywhere to be found. Just cried the whole flight only to land and find out it was a bunch of bullshit. But also what a badass mom. A similar badass in San Francisco reportedly called the police station multiple times asking where he could volunteer his services to help defeat the alien invaders.

Unfortunately, not every story was as entertaining or heroic. One poor bastard in Pittsburgh returned home from work in the middle of the broadcast to find his wife in their bathtub with a bottle of poison in her hand screaming, I'd rather die this way than like that. Oh my God, the article does not say what happened to the woman. Hopefully she survived. Also, man, how quick to completely panic was she? I'd be worried that my wife Lindsay might do something similar. She's so afraid of aliens. I feel like if this happened to her, I would have to stay so vigilant to make

sure she didn't try and take herself out rather than be murdered by fictitious aliens. November 3rd, 1983, a Pennsylvania newspaper called the Harrisburg Telegraph ran a story so vigilant to make sure she didn't try and take herself out rather than be murdered by fictitious aliens. November 3rd, 1983, a Pennsylvania newspaper called the Harrisburg Telegraph ran a story about how some of the locals reacted to the fake broadcast. According to the article, after hearing the news of the Martian invasion, one local man emptied his safe, ran out the street, and just started giving his cash away to strangers. And then even better, after discovering the world wasn't actually going to end, he then got his rifle and ran around town with his rifle threatening random people at gunpoint to give him his money back or else. Incredible. On Halloween afternoon the Columbia Broadcasting System issued a statement saying that the Mercury

Theater's adaptation of The War of the Worlds stayed mostly true to the original story but with a few details changed to make it more entertaining for American audiences. Statement also pointed out that the fact that the broadcast was fictional was announced four times throughout the episode and had previously been advertised prior to the actual recording as being fictional. Nevertheless the statement continued, the program apparently was produced with such vividness that some listeners who may have heard only fragments through the broadcast thought it was fact not fiction

Naturally, it was neither CBS's nor the Mercury Theater's intention to mislead anyone But same day the Federal Communication Commission began an investigation into CBS and the Mercury Theater for quote the terror and fright They caused across the nation Pissed off members of the public and concerned government officials alike demanded CBS and Orson Welles be punished. One state senator in Des Moines, Iowa, named Clyde Herring, issued a press release stating he would introduce a bill in the forthcoming session of Congress that would force radio stations to adhere to much stricter federal regulations and censorship. After this, Senator Herring became the spokesperson for radio censorship. He called the War of the World's broadcast, quote, the Halloween Boogeyman, and was quoted in a Missouri newspaper saying that, "...radio has no more right to present programs like that than someone has the right to come

knocking on our door and screaming." But actually, is it illegal to knock on someone's door and then just start screaming when they answer? It's fucking weird. Concerning. I don't know if it's illegal. He also stated that bedtime stories which involved murder and violence needed to be stopped. I imagine Senator Herring would not be the biggest fan of this show or scared to death.

Others had a vastly different takeaway. Legendary journalist Dorothy Thompson, for example, believed that the real issue the broadcast revealed was not a lack of censorship in American radio, that the real issue the broadcast revealed was not a lack of censorship in American radio, but lack of intelligence amongst the American populace. Good for her. Instead of scolding Orson Welles for tricking Americans into believing Earth was under attack by extraterrestrials, Dorothy Thompson criticized Americans for being too fucking stupid. They should have been smart enough to not believe it. The War of the World's broadcast proved how easily the general populace was convinced of things. Even if what they were being convinced of was outright ridiculous, like Heat Ray welding

Martians destroying New Jersey. Wielding Martians. The broadcast she believed effectively demonstrated how quickly mass mania is spread and she wrote, Orson Welles and the Mercury Theatre have cast a brilliant and cruel light upon the failure of popular education. They have exposed the incredible stupidity, lack of nerve and ignorance of thousands. They have proved how easy it is to start mass delusion. They are uncovered, yeah, they are uncovered the primeval fears lying under the thinnest surface of the so-called civilized man. Mr. Orson Welles ought to be given a Congressional Medal and a National Prize. For Mr. Orson Welles and his theater have made a greater contribution to an understanding of Hitlerism,

Mussoliniism, Stalinism, anti-Semitism, and all other terrorisms of our times than all the words about them have been written by reasonable men. They have made the reductio ad absurdum of mass manias. And how bad were people feeling now who fell for it? Orson Welles made them panic when they thought the broadcast was real. Now, uh, Dorothy Thompson is telling them that they're fucking idiots. Also, what would Dorothy Thompson think about people falling for outlandish conspiracy theories and idiotic propaganda today? Guessing she wouldn't think the QAnon crowd was much smarter than those who thought Orson's broadcast was real.

After receiving some backlash himself at 71 years old, the author of The War of the Worlds, Herbert George Wells, was prompted to comment on the situation. From his home in London, the author stated that when he sold the broadcasting rights of his novel to CBS, quote, it was implicit into the agreement that it was to be used as fiction and not news. I gave no permission whatsoever for alteration that might lead to belief that it was real news. But more than that ol' Herbert, or the Columbia Broadcasting Company, or the cast of the Mercury Theatre, the person that received the brunt of the masses' anger was, of course, Orson Welles.

To the public and the press, Orson was profusely apologetic and professed to be embarrassed by the chaos his show caused. He and other members of his theatre company repeatedly assured interviewers that the outcome of their show was completely unforeseen. Although they did work diligently to write natural and effective dialogue and to produce convincing sound effects, the plot itself was still so outlandish they never thought anyone would actually believe it was real. And this it seems is kind of true. Up until mere hours before the live broadcast was scheduled to begin, everything was a shit show for Orson Welles and the Mercury Theater. Orson and his co-writers John Houseman, Paul Stewart, and Howard Koch could not agree on

how the script should go, and Orson himself was absent for the majority of the prep. He was too busy working on his stage production of the play Danton's Death, which was failing dramatically. Since Orson first decided he wanted to do an episode based on The War of the Worlds, Howard Koch, who was tasked with writing the fake news bulletins in the script, had little faith in the project. When he read the book, which was something he claimed Orson did not do, Koch found it dull and boring. And the more he tried to convert it into a script, the more he hated it. Five days before the broadcast, Koch called his co-writer Hausman, told him the adaptation was hopeless.

Hausman promised that he would ask their director if they could try adapting a different novel instead, but despite his many attempts he could not get a hold of Orson. They were running out of time so Hausmann just decided to lie to Koch, told him Orson refused to do any other novel except War of the Worlds so they better get to writing. The next day the actors minus Orson received the first draft of the script to rehearse. It was a complete and utter disaster That same day one of the actors was asked by a radio critic Ben Gross what the cast had in store for their upcoming broadcasts And the actor told him just between us. It's lousy. It'll probably bore you to death

On October 30th the day of the broadcast Orson arrived to the studio for one last-minute rehearsal When he read the script he almost immediately lost his shit. He started admonishing his cast and crew for their inadequacy, which according to many former coworkers was something he did before almost every broadcast. According to an article at the SmithsonianMag.com, Wells routinely berated his collaborators, calling them lazy, ignorant, and incompetent, many other insults, all while complaining of the mess they'd given him to clean up.

Talk to be a genius. He delighted in making his cast and crew scramble by radically revising the show at the last minute, adding new things and taking others out. Out of the chaos came a much stronger show. This episode was no exception. Over the next few hours, Orson made huge changes to everything about about the script from the pacing to the characters to the plot itself. Orson worked best under pressure when time was running out and too much was at stake. That day he and his crew put their blood sweat and tears into turning the

disaster of a script into something monumental. By 8 p.m. that evening the revisions were complete and the show began. The adaptation that the Mercury Theatre performed on October 30th 1938 was vastly different to what they started the day with. And because of that it was like, as the Smithsonian calls it, a magnificent fluke. So did Orson and his Mercury Theatre cast plan on deceiving their listeners? Probably both yes and no. They did make adjustments to the script to make it more believable. But based on the shitstorm, it began as no one was sure how successful it would be.

But what about Orson Welles? Was he really mortified by the panic it caused? Did he really regret causing it like he said he did? Most people, including myself, would say absolutely not. In the aftermath of the broadcast, he was quoted multiple times saying, if I had planned to wreck my career, I couldn't have gone about it better. But it didn't wreck his career. It launched him to stardom and he knew that. Director of An American Werewolf in London and friend of Orson's, John Landis, said that Orson milked all the publicity surrounding the pandemonium he caused for

all it was worth. That when he appeared before cameras and journalists, sullen and contrite, that was all an act. Orson did later admit that the morning after the broadcast, he had to work hard to conceal his extreme delight at the impact of his work. Yeah, of course! I mean, how could you not be proud of producing and starring in a dramatic retelling of a work of fiction and do such a good job thousands and thousands and thousands of people thought it was absolutely real? However, it's important to note that at the time the impact was likely overstated and exaggerated. While it is true that newspapers across the nation reported

stories of things like suicide, murder, much more likely that the hysteria was confined to overly packed churches, panic phone calls to the police, few traffic jams, general confusion, and some mass exodus, mostly in New York and New Jersey. The evacuation ended fairly quickly when the refugees looked to the sky, found it shockingly void of any alien invaders from Mars. But still, people were running out of their homes down the street. People were jumping into cars fleeing cities. Some people were hopping on planes to rescue loved ones. And what about some random people living alone with their radios out in the sticks? What a wild night some of them must have had. A lot of those people lived in Concrete, Washington. I love this, in the A lot of those people lived in Concrete, Washington.

I love this. In the little 800 person-ish town of Concrete, Washington, 90 minutes north of Seattle, phone lines and electricity suffered a short circuit at the Superior Portland Cement Company substation just as listeners heard New York being destroyed by aliens. What are the odds? Residents were now unable to call neighbors, family or friends to have them calm their fears. And this was happening during a heavy thunderstorm.

During this heavy thunderstorm, panic residents literally running, screaming, crying down the streets. And the pandemonium there lasted for hours. Hours when an entire town truly thought aliens had just destroyed New York and were taking over the country. Ah, here I thought my dick bird prank was a good one. Actually, I still do. It's one of my finest achievements. But I don't have shit on Orson Welles.

The infamous 1938 War of the Worlds broadcast. I found this so entertaining. I hope you enjoyed learning about it at least half as much as I did. And I hope somebody told Johnny and his dad and his mom that they didn't need to hide down in the basement for several months living in terror, afraid of being eviscerated by murderous Martians in their heat rays at any moment. And that is it for this edition of Time Suck Short Sucks. Short Sucks, my God, I think this is my favorite one. If you enjoyed the story, check out the rest of the Bad Magic Catal catalog. Beefier episodes of Time Suck every Monday at noon pacific time. New episodes of the now long-running paranormal

podcast Scared to Death every Tuesday at midnight. And the new horror series within the Scared to Death feed Nightmare Fuel two Fridays a month. Please check it out if you haven't already. Thank you to Molly Jean Box for the initial research and to Logan Keith sweetening up the sound on today's episode. Please go to BadMagicProductions.com for all your bad magic needs and have a great weekend before the world is destroyed by the Martians! Add Magic Productions