The newspapers that used yellow journalism reacted when the USS Maine exploded in Cuba in 1898 by blaming Spain for the explosion. The encouraged the United States to declare war on Spain.
<u>They blamed Spain for the explosion and called for the US to declare war.</u>
When the American naval ship "Maine" sank in Havana Harbor during the Cuban's revolution against Spain on 15 February 1898, the most famous newspapers, who had initiated what we call now "yellow journalism", created a bunch of fake and exaggerated stories blaming the Spain for the explosion, trying to influence the U.S.'s intervention to help the revolutionaries in Cuba. And soon, American opinion demanded intervention.
These famous newspaper, at the time rivals, were the <em>New York Journal </em>by William Randolph Hearst and <em>New York World</em> owned by Joseph Pulitzer.
