Old Time Radio- War of The Worlds

Listening to War of the Worlds on Old Time Radio was a little bit interesting.  It is nothing like the radio today.  The typical announcer voice spoke about situations that occurred and appeared newsworthy. I found it really interesting and almost humorous.  I began by listening to the opening which I was confused by. The words and sayings that were used about people going to and from the earth and people being watched by greater intelligences seemed to be out of the ordinary.  It is apparent that the radio was used for everything.  It was used to discuss the weather, phenomenons and anything to provide to the consumers.  But, it was more of a second by second description of what was going on.  I found it interesting that the announcer was almost unprofessional like.  The way that the radio worked back then was much different than now.

It almost reminds me of the film, I Am Legend because of the end of the world.  When Will Smith is the last person on earth, he uses the radio to see if there is anybody else out there.  The announcer also just used the radio the same way by saying, "Is there anybody there? Is there anybody there?" He talks about being the last human being on earth, and that this could be the last radio show.  The main theme talked about was destruction of the world.

Martians, Mars, Meteorites. The outer world enters the earth and causes destruction.  War of the Worlds discussed how martians were entering the streets and roads were closed, meteorites were hitting the earth and Mars was exploding.  This is not too realistic.  Was this for pure entertainment? Or did they think this was newsworthy?

With a little more research, I found out that this was one of the one of the most popular radio broadcasts.  On October 30, 1938, the War of the Worlds attracted over a million listeners.  About 1/5 of the listeners thought the invasion from Mars was "real and terrifying."  People were moving about frantically to escape from the martians that were invading earth.  Would you believe this broadcast if it aired today in 2011? Or was it just because radio was new to people?