Disinformation and Misinformation: The Fine Art of Exaggeration

It was Sunday night, October 30th, 1938, when we first learned that aliens had invaded at Grover's Mill in New Jersey. Thanks to Orsen Wells, this report came over the radio airwaves on the CBS Mercury Radio Theater on the Air.

According to the news dispatches aired, local law enforcement was informed, and curious folks had come to look. The local radio station arrived with a reporter who was able to report live from the scene to describe everything. The first alien spacecraft crashed into the surface of the earth, and for a time it sat quiet.

Then 60 minutes after it began, the radio play, The War of the Worlds ended, as the invading Martians were rapidly killed off by a simple virus, they had no defense for – and the earth was safe again.

And that story of a how radio play in 1938 panicked a whole nation became the story. There are some sources claiming the viewership was upwards of 2 million that night. That ‘The War of the Worlds’ had traumatized an entire nation. But there are others who claim a different version of history is true. The huge viewership that was claimed in the papers.

See Also:
https://www.buzzfeed.com/madisonmcgee/people-are-sharing-the-wildest-historical-events-that-are - item 7
https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/infamous-war-worlds-radio-broadcast-was-magnificent-fluke-180955180/
https://youtu.be/Xs0K4ApWl4g?si=YgGS1lG85YgBt-LB
https://www.poynter.org/reporting-editing/2013/threatened-by-radio-newspapers-exaggerated-war-of-the-worlds-panic/