Martians have invaded Grover's Mill, New Jersey & New York City!!
This was the premise of Orson Welles' (1915-1985) radio broadcast which was aired on Oct. 30, 1938 as a Halloween episode of his program Mercury Theatre on the Air. This became one of the biggest (although unintentional) pranks in Halloween history as many people who listened to the fake news reports mistakenly believed that they were true. There are stories of people who went to Grover's Mill and called the army, wanting to help fight off the Martian invaders. In the days following the adaptation there was widespread
outrage and panic by certain listeners, who had believed the events
described in the program were real.
You can listen to the whole broadcast here:
Welles' radio broadcast was inspired by the novel The War of the Worlds by English author H.G. Wells (1866-1946), written in 1898. Wells is considered by many to be the father of the science fiction genre and wrote many other successful novels, including The Time Machine, The Invisible Man, and The Island of Dr. Moreau.
If you would like to read The War of the Worlds, I have included a link here which takes you to the entire novel saved as a pdf file.
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