*Picks up a cookie and offers a pitcher of cold milk*<br/><br/>Thank you."<br/><br/>Actually, having heard the original recording in it's entirity and other programs from the same time, it's not hard to believe that so many fell for the misperception. There was only one announcement before the play began to say, "This is a play" to let people know about it, and then only when it was done did anyone realize that mass hysteria had happened.<br/><br/>Orsen Wells was a genius for his time, and relatively unknown at the time, with the format of continuing "News Updates" as the bulk of the story, and the fact that it had never been done before could easily allow the masses to believe it was real.<br/><br/>We must remember that while people of the 1930's, while far from unintelligent, were also generally less exposed to a wider world outside of radio, which was the main news source at the time and very trusted. It would be akin to turning on the news today and seeing Briant Williams somberly announcing that Topeka Kansas just had a terrorist attack. Why would you doubt him for that moment that it might take to confirm it someplace else... would you even confirm it?<br/><br/>The times were already rocky with fears over what was going on in Europe, China and the economic woes of the country. It was the time of the real birth of Science Fiction and without the tell-tell funky background music, it actually sounds very creditable for a news broadcast.