Black smoke (The War of the Worlds) Black smoke (The War of the Worlds) The black smoke, or black powder, is a fictitious poisonous gas in H. G. Wells' 1898 science fiction novel "The War of the Worlds", used by the Martians to eliminate groups of humans, especially artillery crews, and conveyed by shells fired from a gun-like ""black tube"" carried by the Tripods' whip-like tentacles. Any animal inhaling this deadly smoke is killed almost instantly, but the smoke becomes harmless on contact with water. The Martians would dispel it after each use with jets of steam, leaving only a residual, "cindery" black powder, which reminds the
The War of the Worlds (radio drama) because "The Mercury Theatre on the Air", an unsponsored CBS cultural program with a relatively small audience, ran at the same time as the NBC Red Network's popular "Chase and Sanborn Hour" featuring ventriloquist Edgar Bergen. At the time, many Americans assumed that a significant number of "Chase and Sanborn" listeners changed stations when the first comic sketch ended and a musical number by Nelson Eddy began and then tuned in "The War of the Worlds" after the opening announcements, but historian A. Brad Schwartz, after studying hundreds of letters from people who heard "The War of the Worlds", as