Shotgun Shells and Orson Welles // Jessica Storch

Shotgun Shells and Orson Welles

A small-town story about the biggest Halloween hoax our country has ever seen.

//Jessica Storch

“They put me in the back seat of our car, next to the milk, bread, shotgun and shells, and we headed out of town.” This was my father’s recounting of his young family’s escape from their small, rural New Jersey hometown. Dad had been just a young boy at the time of the incident.

The year was 1938, and our nation was on edge. We had just come out of the Great Depression, only to watch Hitler’s rise to power in Germany. Many Americans feared that the worst could happen at any moment. My grandparents, William and Irene Bathgate, were no exception. While thoughts of a possible worldwide catastrophe were always lingering in the corners of their minds, the predictability of day-to-day living provided them an ample amount of immediate security.

Life moved slowly for Pap and Gram at home in Branchville, Sussex County. They were raising their two young children in a small and humble home at the top of Fox Hill Road, a short walk from the center of town. “More often than not, the spoils from a day of Pap’s hunting or fishing were that evening’s dinner. This community has always provided for its sense of country living, with its’ dairy farms, lakes, streams, and meadows,” my father explained to me. He went on to fondly recall a childhood when, “Sunday mornings were for church going, and the afternoons were for porch sitting and waving.”

It was during one of those ordinary moments, on Sunday evening, October 30th, 1938, when Pap, Gram and their young children fell victim to one of the most notorious pranks in the history of our country. Finally settling in for a bit of evening respite, they tuned the dial of their Philco tube radio to a live broadcast of the Orson Welles and Mercury Theater production, War of the Worlds. The program had already begun, but the family was eager to spend a few moments being entertained by what remained.

Many other Americans, like my grandparents who had tuned in to the show late, missed an introduction that clearly described it as a theatrical performance. Instead of dialing into the intended entertainment, they were shocked by reports of a violent extra-terrestrial takeover, and the result was panic! Modern day listeners most likely would have immediately identified the inconceivable storyline as fiction. Yet, as with so many people of the time, my father’s family was vulnerable due to the precarious state of the world. It was later reported that listeners throughout the entire country feared for their lives as well.

“I know what folks these days would think. I’m sure they would get a kick out of the thought of us sitting on the edge of our seats, straining to hear through the static for every bit of information that was reported. But I tell you, you can’t really know what it was like if you weren’t there. Lots of other folks were pretty frenzied as well,” Dad shared with me.

Whether or not the broadcast caused a widespread panic has been debated, but many things are for sure. On October 30, 1938, The Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS) featured War of the Worlds on their radio theater program. The radio play was performed as a series of interruptions to the live performance of an orchestra at The Meridian Room in the Hotel Park Plaza, New York City. These news bulletins created a sense of true, live coverage.

The play was told as if it were breaking news. It claimed to include interviews with college and astronomy professors, a Ph.D. from The National Museum of History in New York, and officers of the state militia. The rising tension from the reports was reinforced with police sirens and frightened eyewitness accounts. Listeners who had turned the program on late had every reason to believe that an alien invasion was taking place.

“As the story unfolded, we believed every bit of it. I remember Pap saying that the hair on the back of his neck stood up straight. We all thought that we were done for,” recalled my father.

The drama, which was told as real-time, terrifying events of an alien invasion, was set in Grovers Mill, NJ, only 75 miles south of his family’s home. Coincidentally, Grovers Mill, in West Windsor Township, shared significant characteristics with Branchville in the early 1900’s. Both small towns could attribute their sustenance to grist mills and active train lines. Surrounded by abundant farmland, residents of Branchville and Grovers Mill enjoyed the many old-time recreational aspects of their respective town ponds.

As the announcer’s intrusions became more frequent, so did the severity of the situation. Welles managed to build suspense at first, with limited and mysterious descriptions of unknown activity on Mars. Then, a “jet of blue flame shot from a gun” and moved toward the Earth. The announcer’s voice trembled, and his pace quickened as a later report informed listeners that a huge flaming object fell on a farm in Grovers Mill. An eyewitness account was then believably told by a voice actor who claimed to have watched the object fall onto his farm.

A scene unfolded that included extraterrestrials exiting a metallic cylinder and intending to begin a war with mankind. “There, I can see the thing’s body. It’s large as a bear and glistens like wet leather. But that face, it… Ladies and gentlemen, it’s indescribable. I can hardly force myself to keep looking at it,” reported Carl Phillips from the scene.

“I remember watching Gram as she closed her eyes, folded her hands together and started saying a prayer for those poor souls that were under attack,” Dad recounted of those intense moments. He went on to say, “To look back on it, I have nothing but respect and admiration for my parents who were just trying to comprehend the seriousness of the situation and decide what they would need to do to protect us.”

The production proceeded with news of Middlesex and Mercer counties being placed under martial law, home evacuations across New Jersey, Red Cross units assigned to emergencies, and Martian cylinders falling all over the United States. A battle between Earth and an invading army from Mars resulted in scenes of human destruction.

While the war on the radio was unfolding, my grandparents devised their own preparations to protect their family. “We believed that the aliens would land at Sussex Airport next, just a few miles from our home, and this put the fear of God in us,” Dad recalled. Pap and Gram set an emergency plan for survival into motion in a matter of minutes. “They threw the necessities for survival in the car, packed up us kids, and we headed to Child’s Park, in Dingmans Ferry, PA to wait out the invasion. The plan was to live out of the car until everything was brought back under control.”

1941 - Dad and his dog Sandy, in front of the Fox Hill home

Frustrated with the limitations of their party line telephone that prevented them from calling loved ones, the young family drove through Branchville, stopping only to quickly convey their plans to those they passed along their escape route. “We had the car radio tuned to the program for the drive up, and it only confirmed for us that we were doing the right thing. Somewhere on our way to the park, Gram said that she had forgotten to feed the cat and lock the door. Those were the only words that anyone spoke for the entire ride.”

Pap drove the family Ford over the winding gravel roads that turned to dirt, crossed over a running stream and finally into the entrance of Child’s Park. Through the dark, the car’s headlights revealed a secluded and rustic camp site, abandoned at the end of summer. “We parked in one of their sites,” my father recounted. “It was just a small clearing with a stone fire pit. Two sides of the perimeter were bordered with dense forest, and Pap told us to stay put in the car and listen to the broadcast. Meanwhile, he went off into the darkness to gather up some kindling for a fire.”

Not too long later, Pap came rushing back to the car. He threw open the back door and said that there was a noise in the woods, branches were breaking and sounds getting closer. Just when he was about to say more, he stopped himself, and grabbed his shotgun and box of shells. Then there was a lot of commotion all at once.

Dad explained, “I heard something like the pounding of footfalls coming from the woods. The next thing I knew, Gram was turned to face us from her front seat. She said to Pap, ‘Did you hear that? The radio! Did you hear it? We can go home.’ But Pap turned away from us with the gun in his hands. He took a quick step forward, heading back toward the pitch black. It seemed like he was ready to go fight, and that’s when Gram called out to him again, ‘I said it’s okay; it was all an act. Let’s go home!’ I could see Pap steady himself for a moment, like he had to make a quick decision, then he turned around and came back to the car.”

Gram had heard the conclusion of the performance. Orson Welles announced to his listeners that War of The Worlds was a radio prank. “We couldn’t soap up your windows and steal all your garden gates by tomorrow night…so we did the next best thing. We annihilated the world before your very ears,” Welles shared with his audience. He went on to say, “…and remember the terrible lesson you learned tonight. That grinning, glowing, globular invader of your living room is an inhabitant of the pumpkin patch, and if your doorbell rings and nobody’s there, that was no Martian… it’s Halloween.”

“When Gram told Pap that it had all been a prank, even I could see the relief on her face and the wetness to her eyes. But I think I was just too young to understand Pap’s reaction. Something else had been out there in the woods, and he was ready to battle whatever it was. He kept that shotgun and the box of shells up in the front seat between him and Gram as we drove home,” Dad shared with me. He went on to say that his parents never spoke again of whatever had been lurking in the darkness at Child’s Park, but from time to time they would retell the other events of that evening.

By Monday morning, newspaper headlines across the country reported the widespread hysteria that had been caused by Sunday evening’s drama. Was the magnitude of listener reactions really as intense as the newspapers claimed? Maybe we will never have a true picture of just how many Americans feared for their lives that night from a time before cell phones, internet connections, and televisions. But for many, including my own father and his family, the trauma was real.

“A lot of people thought it was real, and I suppose that if I had been listening to the radio that night, I would have believed it myself,” recalled Aldo Sayre, of Branchville, who was just a boy at the time. He heard about the broadcast while in town the following day and spoke with several townsfolk who had believed it to be genuine. Mr. Sayre confirmed that the broadcast, “stirred up a lot of people.”

“That Monday, life went back to normal,” my father recalls. “Pap went back to work as a mechanic at the Culver and Van Auken Garage on Broad Street, and Gram tended to us kids,” Dad explains. The shotgun and shells were returned to their resting place on top of the old Hoosier cabinet in the kitchen where they could be grabbed up at any moment for hunting rabbits, squirrels, and deer.

As for Orson Welles, War of the Worlds launched his acting career as one of Hollywood’s legendary film stars. His many professional accomplishments, including Citizen Kane, have led many to refer to him as a genius. A genius who pulled off one of the most memorable hoaxes in our country’s history.

Dad and I recently took a ride up to Child’s Park in Pennsylvania, although it wasn’t the same anymore. The roads that lead there were paved many years ago. Now, they are regulated by an abundance of traffic lights with homes and small businesses built up along the sides. When we thought we had missed a turn, I typed “Child’s Park” into my GPS, and we were directed to back track about two miles. As we pulled into the park’s entrance, we were greeted by two official-looking office buildings and signage that prominently disclosed the park’s rules and regulations.

“To state the obvious, the park isn’t the only thing that’s different now,” Dad shared as we meandered through its off-season camping sites. He stopped and turned to me, “I know that to younger generations it seems my parents had been naïve back then and easily fooled. But, there’s this part to my story, Jessie, that I don’t want to get lost,” he explained. “It’s not an event to add to the adventure of it, nor is it another piece of history.” He paused, thoughtful for a moment, then continued, “What needs to come through is the spirit of Gram and Pap. They had knowledge, guts, and faith. There’s just so many intangibles that come to mind when I think of them. Things that were really put to the test in this experience. I hope that important lesson won’t get lost on the modern day reader.”

He was right. It was true that on that evening of October 30th, 1938, Pap and Gram faced a real battle. Their challenge was to conquer a dark fear of the unknown with their own grit and fortitude. And in the end, my grandparents had been victorious. Their reward was their loving family and the peace and safety of their humble home at the top of Fox Hill Road.

Postcard of Branchville’s Town Square 1936/ 1994 - No. 2 in “Then and Now” series; 1936 photo courtesy of Harvey W. Herdman, 1994 photo courtesy of Joseph Codella

The Culver and Van Auken Garage on the corner of Broad Street and Railroad Avenue, where Pap worked