The two topics I chose for my timeline entry were The War of the Worlds radio broadcast and the Transcontinental railroad. The reason I chose The War of the Worlds broadcast is because I have recently watched the movie which is a solid 6/7 out of 10. The radio broadcast took place October 30th, 1938. For this topic, I decided to look at three aspects of the broadcast. One was the “hysteria” that resulted from it. It was a bit disappointing to find out it was a tiny portion of the population as I had always believed it was wider spread. The others were the history of the show and the actual story. I was surprised to learn the story originated from a book. The difference between the book and the radio show was the location as the book is set in UK. As far as history I wanted to see more about the program itself. The thing I found the most interesting is when Welles said he had done it to teach people not to trust everything they hear. Even with the resources we have today this still a huge problem especially since the creation of social media. The construction of the transcontinental railroad lasted for 6 years from 1863-1869. For the transcontinental railroad entry, I tried to touch on a variety of topics. This is because depending on what you are looking at you can study it a from different angles. Some examples of this are impacts on migration, labor, business, American society, or you can look at the construction itself. However, for my entry I decided to talk about the construction, impact on life, and impact on communication.
Citations
TWOTW Citations
Schwartz, A. Brad. 2015. “The Infamous ‘War of the Worlds’ Radio Broadcast Was a Magnificent Fluke.” Smithsonian. Smithsonian.com. May 6, 2015. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/infamous-war-worlds-radio-broadcast-was-magnificent-fluke-180955180/.
“Did the 1938 Radio Broadcast of ‘War of the Worlds’ Cause a Nationwide Panic?” n.d. Snopes.com. https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/war-of-the-worlds/.
Lapointe, Grace. 2021. “THE WAR of the WORLDS: The Influence of the Novel and Its Infamous Broadcast.” BOOK RIOT. October 28, 2021. https://bookriot.com/war-of-the-worlds/amp/.
Video
“War of the Worlds (1938 Radio Broadcast).” n.d. www.youtube.com. Accessed April 18, 2023. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YTvU9j3og5k&t=4s.
Transcontinental Railroad Citations
Gallagher, Winifred. 2020. “A Brief History of the United States Postal Service.” Smithsonian Magazine. October 2020. https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-institution/brief-history-united-states-postal-service-180975627/.
Ducksters. 2019. “History: First Transcontinental Railroad.” Ducksters.com. 2019. https://www.ducksters.com/history/westward_expansion/first_transcontinental_railroad.php.
Library of Congress. 2015. “The Transcontinental Railroad | History of Railroads and Maps | Articles and Essays | Railroad Maps, 1828-1900 | Digital Collections | Library of Congress.” The Library of Congress. 2015. https://www.loc.gov/collections/railroad-maps-1828-to-1900/articles-and-essays/history-of-railroads-and-maps/the-transcontinental-railroad/.
“Transcontinental Railroad.” HISTORY. A&E Television Networks. September 20, 2018. https://www.history.com/topics/inventions/transcontinental-railroad.
Video
“How the Transcontinental Railroad Transformed America | the Engineering That Built the World (S1).” YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rUmD0jFTnCA.