2 min video (war of the worlds)  (1)


On the evening of October 30 1938, many homes were listening to their radios, some for entertainment and many looking for news from Europe about what Hitler and the Germans were threatening to do. On the NBC Network they were listening to the "Chase and Sanborn Hour", hosted by Don Ameche and featuring comic ventriloquist Edgar Bergen and singer Nelson Eddy, three of the most popular figures in broadcasting. About 15 minutes into the Chase and Sanborn program the first comic sketch ended and a musical number began, and many listeners began tuning around the dial at that point channel surfing for news.

Many of those surfers came across the CBS channel and what they heard startled them,there were  strange and scary things happening. The reporter they heard was out of breath and describing a strange object that had fallen from the sky in a farmers field called Grovers Mill. Strange noise was emanating from the inside the meteorite,the top begins to unscrew, revealing itself as a rocket machine, and onlookers catch a glimpse of a tentacled, pulsating, barely mobile Martian before it incinerates the crowd with "Heat-Rays." The reporters shouts about incoming flames are cut off in mid-sentence,the studio cuts in and says communication from the field has been lost.

This broadcast continues for the next 45 minutes without commercial break,and tells of an alien attack, with heat beams and poison green gas,destruction and death. Serious stuff, except that this is all a play ,a dramatization of the H.G.Wells story, War of the Worlds (2) as it was being presented on Mercury Theater Hour, in news flash fashion. Despite advertisement of its broadcast in the previous days paper,and disclaimers at it,s beginning and end, many who joined in never heard these warnings and took it as real. Panic ensued in many places. While War of the Worlds was in progress, some residents in northeastern cities went to ask neighbors what was happening (many homes still did not have telephones). As the story was repeated, rumors began and caused some panic.

Several people reportedly rushed to the "scene" of the events in New Jersey to see the unfolding events, including a few geologists from Princeton University who went looking for the "meteorite" that had fallen near their school. Some people, who had brought firearms, reportedly mistook a farmer's water tower for a Martian Tripod and shot at it.

Initially Grover's Mill was deserted, but crowds developed. Eventually police were sent to control the crowds. To people arriving later in the evening, the scene really did look like the events being narrated, with panicked crowds and flashing police lights streaming across the masses.

 Some people called CBS, newspapers or the police in confusion over the realism of the news bulletins. There were instances of panic throughout the US as a result of the broadcast, especially in New York and New Jersey.

Seattle CBS affiliate stations KIRO and KVI broadcast Orson Welles' radio drama. While this broadcast was heard around the country, it made a deep impact in Concrete, Washington. At the point where the Martian invaders were invading towns and the countryside with flashes of light and poison gases, a power failure plunged almost the entire town of 1,000 into darkness. Some listeners fainted while others grabbed their families to head into the mountains. Others headed for the hills to guard their moonshine stills. One was said to have jumped up out of his chair and, in bare feet, run two miles to the center of town. Some men grabbed their guns, and one Catholic businessman got his wife into the car, drove to the nearest service station and demanded gasoline. Without paying the attendant, he rushed to Bellingham, Washington (50 miles away) to see his priest for a last-minute absolution of sins. He reportedly told the gas-station attendant that paying for the gas "[wouldn't] make any difference, everyone is going to die!"

Because phone lines as well as electricity were out, residents were unable to call neighbors, family or friends to calm their fears. Of course, the real story was not as fantastic as the radio drama: all that had occurred was that the Superior Portland cement company's sub-station suffered a short-circuit with a flash of brilliant light, and the town's lights went dark. The more conservative radio-listeners in Concrete (who had been listening to Charlie McCarthy on another station), calmed neighbors by assuring that they hadn't heard about any "disaster". Reporters heard soon after of the coincidental blackout of Concrete and sent the story over the newswire and soon the town of Concrete was known worldwide.

Edgar Bergen and Don Ameche, who were continuing their Chase & Sanborn Hour broadcast on NBC, are often credited with "saving the world". It is said many listeners were reassured by hearing their tones on a neighboring station.

That same year In a prophetic column in the New York Tribune, Dorothy Thompson foresaw that the broadcast revealed the way politicians could use the power of mass communications to create theatrical illusions, 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." WOW (3)

I know this was long and I hope it was interesting to you, but it was also to make a point, that  Dorothy  Thompson words  " "But Mr. Welles scared thousands into demoralization with nothing at all" could apply just as well if applied to Rush Limbaugh or Glen Beck. Using nothing but fiction they are creating panic in the unaware and it is showing up as anger across the land, and in the town halls.Rush and Beck no more believe what they are saying than they believe in Martians, but it has sucked in an unwary audience and frightens them,that means cash and notoriety for these dramatists. It is immoral but it works,every interview that I have seen of the angry people at town halls they sooner or later repeat the words of these men,that is where they get their thoughts and information.

If this is true then much of the anger we see has been agitated by these men and the Fox broadcasting network in particular? Reciprocating with anger against the common citizens like ourselves will help to do nothing but  stoke the fires of rage. The anger should be reserved for the broadcast manipulators and networks, directed at exposing them as liars and fakes anyway we can.By writing their sponsors and calmly saying that what these men and their networks are saying is unappreciated. This works as we see in the case of sponsors pulling their ads on Glen Beck. I say again , "this works". We must beware the hate baiters who are itching for violence, just waiting for one finger to be laid upon them,any excuse will do. Be the calming voice.

Edgar Bergen and Don Ameche, who were continuing their Chase & Sanborn Hour broadcast on NBC, are often credited with "saving the world". It is said many listeners were reassured by hearing their tones on a neighboring station."

 Here is a link to many of the Mercury Theater great broadcasts Mercury Theater Online

Ref links :

(1) War of the Worlds clip

(2) Wiki (war of the worlds)

(3) Wow (about.com)

(4) Bonus ( test reel footage 1949)