Sci Fi History: War of the Worlds (1938)

H.G. Wells wrote War of the Worlds in 1898. Forty years later, Orson Welles broadcast a dramatization of the novel on radio. Many panicked believing the program real. Some attribute the hysteria to worries about Nazi Germany. Whatever the cause, Welles became a star and soon produced Citizen Kane. Meanwhile, the classic broadcast demonstrated the power of mass media, mass hysteria, and science fiction!