War of the Worlds Panic

By Tom Ferguson

On October 30, 1938 Orson Welles and the Mercury Theater of the Air presented The War of the Worlds by H.G. Wells. Over a million people panicked thinking it was real and that Mars was invading the Earth. To understand this phenomenon, we must examine Orson Welles, the Mercury Theater ensemble, the show itself and the times it was presented in.

Orson Welles was a great artist and a grand showman in equal measure. His creativity has been compared to an open fire hydrant; it took his partnership with John Houseman to bring it into its best use. As much as he revered classical literature (from Shakespeare to Kafka), he also adored popular cultural forms like the magic show and genres like thrillers, horror tales and melodramas. Crucially, Welles never kept art and show business separate; he played everything both for sensational thrills and for poetic resonance. Although Welles can often seem like a prophet of the postmodern, few today are able to work on these dual levels in the way he did.

Orson Welles insisted on doing an adaptation of H.G. Wells War of the Worlds for his Halloween show even though his advisors thought that it would prove too boring for the radio audience. Originally Lorna Doone was to air but three weeks before the broadcast, Welles told producer, John Houseman and writer, Howard Koch of the change. Under Welles direction, Koch set the Martian invasion in modern America. To add impact, the first half of the drama was written and performed so it would sound like a news broadcast about an invasion from Mars. This was the first time that this technique had been used. Koch, fearing that the play would be a flop, went to bed early that night, missing the show.

What added the greatest impact to the show was the incredible timing. Welles directed the actors, sound effects, dialog, and music like it was a complex symphony. In all of the Mercury Theater’s work the use of George Herrmann's music is sparing and precise; Welles once said that he worked closely, note for note, with the composer. Equally sparing is Welles' use of sound effects. Also, keep in mind that in 1938, radio broadcasts were presented live.

As for the show itself, on Sunday evening, at 8 p.m. Eastern time, a voice on CBS said: "The Columbia Broadcasting System and its affiliated stations present Orson Welles and the Mercury Theatre of the Air in 'The War of the Worlds,' by H.G. Wells." The play itself started off in a quiet and somewhat boring way with a simulated radio program featuring dance music. As the play unfolded, the dance music was interrupted a number of times by fake news bulletins reporting that a "huge flaming object" had dropped on a farm near Grovers Mill, New Jersey. The bulletins started just over five minutes into the show. Just before this on another network, Edgar Bergen and Charley McCarthy show had just finished their opening skit and many people started the 1938 version of channel surfing and landed on the Mercury Theater’s news bulletins. For the next half hour the intensity of the news bulletins increased. The broadcast contained several explanations that it was all a radio play, but if members of the audience missed a brief explanation at the beginning, the next one didn't arrive until 40 minutes into the program.

At one point in the broadcast, an actor playing a newscaster in the field described the emergence of one of the aliens from its spacecraft. "Good heavens, something's wriggling out of the shadow like a gray snake," he said, in a dramatic tone. "Now it's another one, and another. They look like tentacles to me. There, I can see the thing's body. It's large as a bear and it glistens like wet leather. But that face. It... it's indescribable. I can hardly force myself to keep looking at it. The eyes are black and gleam like a serpent. The mouth is V-shaped with saliva dripping from its rimless lips that seem to quiver and pulsate.... The thing is raising up. The crowd falls back. They've seen enough. This is the most extraordinary experience. I can't find words. I'm pulling this microphone with me as I talk. I'll have to stop the description until I've taken a new position. Hold on, will you please, I'll be back in a minute." Later, we hear the reporter’s death and an ominous thud as the microphone hits the ground and then several seconds of silence.

Listening to the simulated newscasts, 1.2 million people concluded that they were hearing an actual news account of an invasion from Mars. People packed the roads, hid in cellars, loaded guns, and even wrapped their heads in wet towels as protection from Martian poison gas, in an attempt to defend themselves against aliens. One man ran out to his kennel of great danes and upon releasing them shouted “Fend for yourselves boys!” While there were no actual fatalities, one man arrived at home just in time to stop his wife from taking poison so she wouldn’t fall into Martian hands.

At the end of the broadcast, police raided the studio confiscating scripts and segregating the players. The cast was made to think that thousands died. Houseman thought that the ditches were choked with copses.

In a column, in the New York Tribune, Dorothy Thompson foresaw that the broadcast revealed the way politicians could use the power of mass communications to manipulate the public. "All unwittingly, Mr. Orson Welles and the Mercury Theater of the Air have made one of the most fascinating and important demonstrations of all time," she wrote. "They have proved that a few effective voices, accompanied by sound effects, can convince masses of people of a totally unreasonable, completely fantastic proposition as to create a nation-wide panic.

"They have demonstrated more potently than any argument, demonstrated beyond a question of a doubt, the appalling dangers and enormous effectiveness of popular and theatrical demagoguery....

"Hitler managed to scare all of Europe to its knees a month ago, but he at least had an army and an air force to back up his shrieking words.

"But Mr. Welles scared thousands into demoralization with nothing at all."
To understand how all this could happen, you must look at what was happening in the world. On March 11, 1938 Germany invaded Austria. May 20th, the “May Crisis” with Germany threatening war in Czechoslovakia. On May 28th, Hitler told his generals, "It is my unshakable will that Czechoslovakia shall be wiped off the map." He instructed them to develop a plan for completing this by October 1st. September 12th, Hitler makes his speech at the Nuremberg Rally. On Thursday, September 29th, the four powers, Germany, England, France and Italy met in Munich to decide the fate of Czechoslovakia and on October 1st Germany occupies the Sudeten German territory in Czechoslovakia. Also in October the Spanish Civil War raged. Over the Ebro front the Fascists operate up to 200 planes at the same time, a number never seen in any war on the world before. The Republican Army of the Ebro is bombed to pieces. On October 21st, the Spanish government pulls back the International Brigades. In other parts of the world, on October 21st Japan occupies Canton and other important Chinese cities. All of this was reported on the radio in a constant stream of news bulletins. They all knew a world war was coming, is it no wonder that they were ready to panic at the drop of a hat?