Mercury Theater and Lady Esther Presents Orson Welles and Mercury Summer Theater

He was slugged, clubbed, chloroformed, gassed, knifed, dynamited, run down, gunned down, injected with poison, ejected from planes, hurled from cliffs, pushed in front of trains, almost devoured by man-eating plants, virtually sucked dry of his 'life essence,' nearly shot to the Moon in a rocket--and the number of times the floor suddenly dropped from beneath him must run into four figures.

Actor and director Orson Welles along with John Houseman was responsible for the creation and popularity of Mercury Theater with $110 for production costs. It was a relatively short lived show – only five months, but it remains one of the most culturally significant shows in entertainment history.

The Mercury Theater on the Air concentrated on classic literature such as "Treasure Island," "The Count of Monte Cristo" and "Dracula. Radio listeners knew that the show was unique and the acting of Virginia Welles (Mrs. Orson Welles), Agnes Moorehead, Joseph Cotten, and Everett Sloane and others as well as the musical compositions by Bernard Herrmann was exceptional.

One of most famous of all old time radio show, which aired on October 30th, 1937, was the "War of the Worlds. Orson Welles and writer Howard Koch converted the well know H.G. Wells story into a seemingly live new broadcast; this episode of Mercury Theater terrified the nation into believing that the Martians were attacking Earth.

The popularity and the press that this show received earned it a sponsorship from Campbell's Soup and the name of the show was soon changed to The Campbell's Playhouse.