Apparently the "fallout" was an exaggeration that Orson went along with because it gave him more publicity. From the Wikipedia:
>"The supposed panic was so tiny as to be practically immeasurable on the night of the broadcast. ... Radio had siphoned off advertising revenue from print during the Depression, badly damaging the newspaper industry. So the papers seized the opportunity presented by Welles’ program to discredit radio as a source of news. The newspaper industry sensationalized the panic to prove to advertisers, and regulators, that radio management was irresponsible and not to be trusted."
and
"Welles later embraced the story as part of his personal myth. "Houses were emptying, churches were filling up; from Nashville to Minneapolis there was wailing in the streets and the rending of garments," he told Peter Bogdanovich years later."
"CBS, too, found reports ultimately useful in promoting the strength of its influence. radio management was irresponsible and not to be trusted."
I loved to ask my grandmother about this because she recalled listening to the original broadcast. She said the station would take commercial breaks to interrupt the story, and they reminded listeners it was a fictitious broadcast when taking these breaks. She didn't believe that anyone could be fooled by it, at least not to the extent that was reported.
According to family folk lore, during WWII when they had double summer time, my grandmother managed to put the clocks 2 hours forwards instead of 2 hours back. So woke up in the small hours and turned on radio to BBC and heard German (they transmitted to Germany as propaganda, and during night used channels normally broadcasting in English). Immediately wakes whole household - "we've been invaded - the Germans have taken over the BBC"!
This is true about how the events unfolded in the US, but the “War of the Worlds” story was translated and re-broadcast in Latin America where it had a much more devastating effect. In Ecuador, even the army and the police were rushed to the site where the invasion was supposedly taking place, intensifying the panic for average citizens. Never underestimate the potential power of a fictional story that is irresponsibly disclosed.
Fascinating - thanks for sharing. Newspapers always play the same dirty tricks - they're doing the same now with the tech reporting because they're losing ad revenue to the tech companies.
>"The supposed panic was so tiny as to be practically immeasurable on the night of the broadcast. ... Radio had siphoned off advertising revenue from print during the Depression, badly damaging the newspaper industry. So the papers seized the opportunity presented by Welles’ program to discredit radio as a source of news. The newspaper industry sensationalized the panic to prove to advertisers, and regulators, that radio management was irresponsible and not to be trusted."
and
"Welles later embraced the story as part of his personal myth. "Houses were emptying, churches were filling up; from Nashville to Minneapolis there was wailing in the streets and the rending of garments," he told Peter Bogdanovich years later."
"CBS, too, found reports ultimately useful in promoting the strength of its influence. radio management was irresponsible and not to be trusted."