SOME RANDOM DID YOU KNOW #2: The "War of the Worlds" Mass Hysteria

History says that in October 30, 1938, Orson Welles, then just a radio actor and producer and still a few years away from being the “Citizen Kane” director, broadcasted a play based on H.G. Wells’ “War of the Worlds”, adapting it as a news broadcast reporting the Martian invasión described in the book.

Legend says that it provoked mass hysteria, with people flocking on the streets in dire panic, acts of pillage stormed through the streets of U.S.A., lots and lots of desperation, millions of dollars in loss…

It’s a myth that has survived through the years, firmly embedded into pop culture to the point that The Simpsons made a Treehouse of Horror episode referencing the incident. Incident that never took place.

Truth is, while being realistically produced as a news bulletin with no commercial breaks, it couldn’t cause much because it didn’t have that much of an audience to begin with. Newspapers made the hoax as a meaning to give bad reputation to radio, which were affecting printed press in diminished sales, smaller influence and audience.

Actually, some outrage against the broadcast roared through the next few days, in part fueled by the newspapers.

Now, THOSE are fake news.