Today in History–in 1938 Orson Wells’ War of the World airs on the Radio, read a news report about the panic in response

#OTD in 1938 – Orson Welles broadcasts his radio play of Wells’s The War of the Worlds, causing anxiety in some of the audience in the US. pic.twitter.com/0EvJbuJgnb

— Oxford Classics (@OWC_Oxford) October 30, 2017

Churches in both New York and New Jersey were filled suddenly with persons seeking protection, and who found them, providentially as they thought ,open.

At St. Michael’s Hospital, in Newark, fifteen persons were treated for shock.

In New York, police and fire departments and the newspapers were swamped with telephone calls from people, apparently frightened half out of their wits.

The telephone company also was deluged. The thing finally assumed such serious proportions that the Colombia Broadcasting System put bulletins on the air explaining that the “meteor” broadcast was part of a play and that nothing untoward had happened.

Read it all.