DVS
A ghost from your dreams
- Joined
- Apr 17, 2002
- Posts
- 11,416
Orson Wells' broadcast of The War of the Worlds
I wasn't around to see it, and I think it's safe to say none of us were. My mother was just a kid living in Chicago. She said there were people out in the street. It was a different time, for sure. No Internet, no cable TV, no satellites to give you any look outside of your own local neighborhood.
Today, I think we take too many things for granted. I'm old enough to remember times similar to 1938. No cell phones, no Internet and no computers. I remember the first time I saw a TV. It was black and white. They all were black and white. The screen was about 12 inches square. The reception was sometimes fuzzy, wavy from interference with ghost images and broadcast channels went off air at midnight.
But back then, television was possible, but still very expensive. Radio was still very much the way people got their news. They really had no other way of finding out what was going on, except to wait until the morning paper showed up. While I know it wasn't a mass of frightened people out in the streets, there were some, and they were sure we were being invaded by aliens from another planet.
I think we should take a look at all of the innovations we have in this 21st century and think of how it was back then. How would we survive without our toys? I can imagine how someone would think it was real. Those radio broadcasts were very vivid with the different sound effects they had to tweak the listener's imagination. Some were tweaked a little too much that night.
I wasn't around to see it, and I think it's safe to say none of us were. My mother was just a kid living in Chicago. She said there were people out in the street. It was a different time, for sure. No Internet, no cable TV, no satellites to give you any look outside of your own local neighborhood.
Today, I think we take too many things for granted. I'm old enough to remember times similar to 1938. No cell phones, no Internet and no computers. I remember the first time I saw a TV. It was black and white. They all were black and white. The screen was about 12 inches square. The reception was sometimes fuzzy, wavy from interference with ghost images and broadcast channels went off air at midnight.
But back then, television was possible, but still very expensive. Radio was still very much the way people got their news. They really had no other way of finding out what was going on, except to wait until the morning paper showed up. While I know it wasn't a mass of frightened people out in the streets, there were some, and they were sure we were being invaded by aliens from another planet.
I think we should take a look at all of the innovations we have in this 21st century and think of how it was back then. How would we survive without our toys? I can imagine how someone would think it was real. Those radio broadcasts were very vivid with the different sound effects they had to tweak the listener's imagination. Some were tweaked a little too much that night.
