Shortwave Center, March 1997
60th Birthday Of First Commercial SW BC Station In Uruguay
February 19, 1997 marked the 60th anniversary of the first international, commercial station on shortwave from Uruguay. On February 19th, 1937 at 2100 local time CXA2, Radio Continental, signed on in Spanish from Montevideo with the slogan “La Voz Criolla del Rio de la Plata”, with music, news, and advertisements.
The station was owned by “Senores” Racine, Caissiol, and the Bonifacino Bros. Later, a German-born person living in Argentina bought in. Mr. Alberto Fernandez was manager of the station. The transmitter was separated from the studio, at a site which belonged to a tile manufacturing company, named “Deus”. The station’s choice of frequency was at first criticized in an article published in “Cine Radio Actualidad”, February 26, 1937. They said, “Transmissions on this wavelength will not travel well over long distances. They will never be received reliably. We are well experienced with all the stations that regularly use this range on the SW, mainly the Central American ones, which are seldom heard here”. Anyway, Radio Continental’s signals were reportedly well received in Europe. The output power was 5 KW.
A short time into WWII the owners were known to be sympathetic to the Axis countries. The station was included on the “Black List” and, as a consequence, the owners of the building revoked the lease. Mr. Racine and Mr. J. Schmidt, the German, were told to leave.
CXA2 came to its demise on August 5, 1942. The Montevideo newspaper “El Pais” reported the next day that the Deuses advised the police that a great explosion was heard coming from near their home. The noise came from the little shack used by CXA2. Only the steel skeleton of the transmitter was recognizable.
Nothing remained from the station’s bombing. The fire department said it was not an accident, because the electrical supply to the transmitter site was off. They believed a timer-controlled device caused the explosion, but they could not know the identity of the people that set that bomb. The mystery continues to be unresolved, sixty years later. (Horatio Nigro)
9650.1 Emisora Ciudad de Montevideo (9650) of Uruguay started a period of about a month of extended broadcasts into the first hours of UTC mornings on February 9th.. They cover the “Concurso Oficial de Agrupaciones Carnavalescas” which will elect the best artistic performances of various Carnival musical groups, traditionally linked with the soul of the Montevidean people. Of eminent popular roots, they are included in several categories: “murgas” (organized associations of singers with well based history, which focuses on parody and comical sketches of the main social/political facts in the past year. The choirs (of about ten persons) are traditionally composed by men, with their faces painted with vivid and happy colors, and a full display of colorful costumes. Also, there are drum beating performances of the “agrupaciones lubolas”, with “candombe”, which is the distinctive music that reflects the African tradition in Uruguay. When a Uruguayan has left his country, for long years, to live and work abroad (they are about 300.000), in search of better economical stability for him and his family, his heart and memories usually will remain connected in a strong manner with this sort of tradition, which grew with him during his childhood and adolescence in his native country. The goal of this broadcaster is to bring the sounds of this cultural manifestation via shortwave to the Uruguayan communities living on foreign countries. Live full broadcast of the artistic numbers are made, every night except on rainy days, direct from the “Teatro de Verano” ( “Summer Theater”) in Montevideo .The question is: how many Uruguayans living abroad own a SW receiver to follow these broadcasts, who were born in a country with almost no tradition with an International Radio Service. (Horatio Negro)
Radio Prague Special
Radio Prague have an A5 center-stitched, 28 page, 60th anniversary booklet printed in three colours on glossy art paper with a board cover. Beautifully type-set and well laid-out it describes the history of the station and its various language services throughout the period of review.
The past 60 years have been anything but easy for this Central European broadcastersilenced for six years during World War II, followed by another 40 yearswith a notable exception in the late sixtiesby permanent conflict between the ruling ideology and courageous yet powerless journalists.
The forerunner of the tube manufacturer TESLA”Elektra” transmitted experimental short wave signals on a 10-50 watt unit from their factory around 1923 and a British listener wrote to an early 1960’s Prague DX programme saying he remembered hearing them.
Several attempts were made from 1924 onwards by the Prague-based Radiojournal Broadcasting Company to air international music programmes presented in English and Esparanto on medium wave which gave long- distance reception during the hours of darkness in those days. In 1926 Radiojournal launched the most powerful transmitter in Europe. This new 5 kW transmitter who’s output equalled the combined power of all radio transmitters then operating in Asia began by testing with classical music across the Atlantic. The response indicated that the signal on a wavelength of 368 meters reached America loud and clear.
The construction of a SW transmitter at Podebrady was sanctioned in 1934 and the work was expedited as the political situation in Europe worsened. The first test by the 30 kW unit was during the night of 24 July 1936. The second test on 13 August 1936 lasted for 24 hours with foreign-language announcements interspersing gramophone records. Radio Prague, call sign OLR, commenced regular shortwave broadcasting at 0900 GMT on 31 August 1936. During the first year Radio Prague was on the air for 769 hours, more than six hours every day and the station received 4443 letters from across the world.
New languages were added and broadcasting hours extended until by 1939 Radio Prague was on the air for 19 hours a day. During the Nazi occupation Radio Prague remained silent although the transmitter was used for three hours a day to broadcast propaganda to ex-patriots living in North America.
The legendary “Calling All Czechs” message went out on 5th May, 1945. Prague was back on the air. Thereafter services in many languages were introduced, but by 1946 forced by economic consideration the half-hour format of the newly added languages was reduced to 15 minutes.
After the Communist coup in 1948 Czechoslovak Radio was nationalized to become a propaganda mouthpiece for Moscow. Even so, expansion continued apace with the [Bratislava] Velke Kostolany 100 kW facility being inaugurated in May of the following year. Litomysl [east of Prague] was inaugurated in 1955 with two 100 kW units and a 300 kW medium wave transmitter, composed of two 150 kW units. Then in May 1956, two Tesla 100 kW short wave transmitters were installed at Rimavska Sobota [in Southern Slovakia, near Hungarian border]. During 1968-1969 the two Litomysl transmitters were replaced by five Tesla 100 kW units. This was followed by the replacement of the Velke Kostolany units with 100 kW Tesla units.
Then, with 1968 wind of change of the “Prague Spring” things seemed to be better, until at 0130 GMT on 21st August 1968, Radio Prague broke the news to the world that Warsaw Pact troops were invading the country. At noon the National Anthem was played during a bulletin of news during which submachine gun fire could be heard. About 20 people were killed during the battle for the radio station. Clandestine broadcasting followed for a short time. For the next 20 years Radio Prague was under strict Communist control.
From 1972 the famous Interprogram unit began broadcasting news, comment with plenty of music in five languagesCzech, Slovak, English, German, and French. This was achieved when two synphased aerials at Litomysl were rigged to enable the grouping of the 100 kW units to achieve 400- 500 kW power for the daytime broadcasts of the multilingual programme on 6055 kHz. Between 1979-1982 two 250 kW Soviet built transmitters were installed at Rimavska Sobota, followed later by two more.
With the collapse of the Iron Curtain in November 1989, Radio Prague returned to its pre-war signature tune, the fanfare from the New World Symphony by Dvorak played on a French horn. All foreign language broadcasts were suspended on 1st April, 1990 while the authorities took stock. Four 250 kW, seven 100 kW SW transmitters and two medium wave transmitters had been in use by the communist authorities.
As Radio Prague International the station returned to the air on 7th May, 1990 with one 100 kW at Velke Kostolany, 2 x 250 kW at Rimavska Sobota, and 2 x 100 kW at Litomysl, plus the Interprogram transmitters in operation. From August that year, Litomysl commenced to carry Czech and Slovak services of RFE and from the end of the year one of Litomysl’s 100 kW transmitters was used for the Czech Home service relay on 5930 kHz.
Radio Prague became the broadcasting service of the Czech Republic when the country split into two nations. During 1994 rising costs compelled Radio Prague to abandon three 100 kW outlets at Litomysl, and the one 100 kW unit at Velke Kostolany. This was followed a 1995 decision to abandon shared use of the 250 kW units at Rimavska Sobota, now in Slovakia, leaving just two 100 kW transmitters at Litomysl under Czech control in operation. It is these transmitters that carry today’s programmes in Czech, German, Spanish, French, and English (12 half-hour slots a day). The Czech Home Service to Europe 0300-2300 (0400-2300 Sat & Sun) is now on long wave 270 kHz from Uherske Hradiste.
Quite a number of Czech Ham/DXers joined the World Communications Club of Great Britain just prior to and during the Prague Spring. Their memberships extended into the newly re-formed World DX Club but their enthusiasm quickly diminished under new communist administration.
Despite all Prague’s financial troubles funds were found to produce a fine historical document which was used to compile this featurette. (Radio Prague, via WDXC Contact, Feb 1997)
Radio Marti
On Feb 4 the Miami Herald reported the US State Department Inspector General (IG) found, “a pattern of ‘personnel mismanagement’ including deficiencies in procedures for hiring, documenting duties and reassigning staff” at R Marti. The IG’s office also announced it is now conducting a review of Radio Marti’s policies for ensuring that the content of broadcasts to Cuba adheres to U.S. government standards for objectivity and balance. (Via Joe Buch)
Grenada-Media/Too Many Radio Stations With Too Little To Say
Source: Inter Press Service via Ulis Fleming
ST. GEORGE’S–Inter Press Service: More than 40 years after the first radio station aired its first newscast here, the eastern Caribbean island of Grenada is experiencing what many are calling a virtual media explosion.
But with eight radio stations already broadcasting and another three scheduled to hit the airwaves before the end of the year, two television stations and a third in the making, a private cable TV service and four weekly newspapers, many are beginning to question the sustainability of so many communication outlets in the 344 square kilometer island, whose population is less than 100,000.
“I think some of them will fall by the roadside because there isn’t the market to support them financially and broadcasting is a very expensive thing,” says Jerry Romain who has been in the business of broadcasting for the past 25 years.
There are just too many radio stations with too little to say, says another observer.
In such a situation, says Romain, programming will make the difference between those which survive and those which are forced out of the market.
The first radio station was opened in Grenada in 1952. One year later, the Windward Islands Broadcasting Service (WIBS) began transmitting news and current affairs programs to all the islands. But as the islands were at that time also seeking independence from their colonial masters, each moved to establish its own broadcasting service.
“Now there is a proliferation of stations and one hears talk of a large number of new licenses being issued and a number of those stations are now on the air,” says Ray Smith, former president of the Caribbean Broadcasting Union (CBU).
Smith, a former acting manager of WIBS, says with so many radio stations competing with each other for limited financing, few will be able to excel. Funds for hiring experienced and professional people will not be available since there simply won’t be enough advertising dollars to go around.
The same concerns were expressed some four years ago with the expansion of the media in Trinidad and Tobago and Jamaica and there were cries then that too many communication outlets were chasing too few advertising dollars.
In 1991 the Trinidad and Tobago government granted 23 broadcast licenses–12 for television and 11 for radio–to private entrepreneurs.
Between 1991 and 1993 the country moved from one to three television stations, from three weekly newspapers to eight and from two radio stations to five, while cable television, privately owned like many of the radio and television stations, began reaching an increasing number of homes, and satellite dishes sprouted in the more affluent suburbs.
Jamaica, which had just two radio stations in 1989, now has eight. The more than 160-year-old Daily Gleaner is now facing competition from the Jamaica Observer, a weekly tabloid which hit the news stands in 1993.
The Jamaica Broadcasting Corporation (JBC) which held the monopoly on television broadcasting since the entry of that medium into the region in the 1960s is now facing competition from another privately-owned television station which hit the airwaves in 1993.
But the increase in media outlets in Grenada is being hailed by the Keith Mitchell administration, which has been accused of censorship in the past, especially at the state-owned Grenada Broadcasting Corporation (GBC).
“The evidence will show how open we are to the media and the commitment to give the public every opportunity to express themselves,” says Mitchell.
Last year “political victimization, muzzling the press and interfering with freedom of expression,” became common phrases in the vocabulary of many Grenadians.
Mitchell’s New National Party (NNP) was accused of replacing hard-working employees at the GBC with persons aligned to the party. Mitchell fired back stating that the press in Grenada is as free as anywhere else.
“It’s rather strange to hear that this government is being accused of curtailing press freedom which is clearly far from the truth,” he said then.
Marconi Memorabilia
The Feb 10 issue of US News & World Report, page 55, says that GEC-Marconi, the British defense contractor, is auctioning off “the archives of wireless communications pioneer Gugliomo Marconi” through Christie’s auction house in April. The report indicates that the auction is expected to bring on the order of $1.5 million. The items are said to include “original patents and equipment, and messages to and from the sinking Titanic”. Christies does have a Web site at (http://www.christies.com/Christie.htm) and it turns out you can order catalogs from them on-line or by phone. Prices for catalogs seem to run anywhere between 5 pounds U.K./$8 U.S. to 26 pounds U.K./ $45 U.S. You won’t find the Marconi catalog there as yet though, but it is expected to be published sometime in March. (Source: USN&WR and internet postings via Joe Buch)