Category Archives: QSL Gallery

Shortwave Memories — Ghana’s North American Service

by Karl D. Forth

Many of the African nations achieved independence in the 1960s, and as they raised their new national flag they wanted to be connected to the outside world. One of the first things they often did was build an airport so they could be accessible. The second was setting up a shortwave radio station so their national voice could be heard both domestically and internationally.

Radio Ghana, an early independent country (1957), took this a step further by establishing a North American shortwave service, audible in the mid-afternoon in the eastern United States. In my early listening months, this was one of the more exotic places I could receive on my portable shortwave radio.

I sent them a letter, seeking a QSL card verifying reception, and more information. Employees at the Accra General Post Office gathered letters, rather infamously so, and a few weeks later I received a pen pal aerogram from a postal worker in Accra. At the time, this was welcome and a little bit exciting. I remember showing the first letter to my mother and father. They seemed to approve, with a reaction of “this hobby may not be so bad.”

My correspondence with the postal employee continued for a year or two, beyond the life of the North American service. He never did ask for money or anything else (many other listeners received requests for money from other postal workers), but he did dispense a bit of advice that I’ve always remembered. After learning that I was a high school student, he advised: Don’t Play With Books. That means don’t screw around with your educational opportunity.

Ghana Broadcasting Corp. had a number of frequencies for domestic broadcasts in places such as Ejura and Tema. The external service was based in the capital, Accra, and its broadcasts included two frequencies to North America from 2000 to 2100 GMT daily.

For many years after the North American service ended, Ghana could be heard on several 60 meter frequencies in the late evening and sometimes during late winter afternoons.

Karl D. Forth has been interested in radio and DXing for more than 50 years. This story was included in the book Radio Nights and Distant Signals.

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Radio Bulgaria Marks Its 90th Anniversary with a New QSL Card Series

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Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor Paul Jamet, who shares the following update and QSL card images related to Bulgarian National Radio (BNR) and Radio Bulgaria.

As Radio Bulgaria looks ahead to its 90th anniversary in 2026, Bulgarian National Radio has announced a new commemorative QSL card series for listeners who submit reception reports. The series will include 12 different QSL cards, each highlighting a key moment from the history of BNR and the Radio Bulgaria service. According to BNR, a new card will be released each month, along with a short publication explaining the historical background behind the featured image.

One of the cards commemorates Bulgaria’s first radio transmission in 1929, an important milestone that marked the beginning of organized radio broadcasting in the country. Additional background articles from BNR revisit the early days of Radio Bulgaria and trace how the service evolved into an international broadcaster with listeners around the world.

Paul also points to a broader retrospective titled “BNR at 90 – A Story of Pride and No Prejudice,” which looks back on nine decades of Bulgarian National Radio. The piece reflects on BNR’s history through periods of political change and technological transition, while underscoring the role of public broadcasting in preserving culture and maintaining a connection with international audiences.

Attached at the top and bottom of this post are two QSL cards from Paul’s own collection.

Many thanks again to Paul for sharing both the news and the QSL images!

A DXer Looks Back at the Voice of America

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by Dan Greenall

50 years ago, Voice of America broadcasts could be found all over the shortwave dial.

In addition to a number of transmitter sites located stateside, the VOA used to broadcast from a number of other facilities located in overseas countries in order to help get its signal into all corners of the globe. Many of these “relay” stations made for challenging DX catches and there was even an award offered by NASWA to those providing sufficient proof of reception of them all. An example of this can be found on this link: https://k5nd.net/2011/06/voice-of-america/

The familiar tune of Yankee Doodle (heard at the beginning and end of a transmission) along with station ID in English would often include the particular transmitter site in use. Several old recordings of these can be found on my links to these on the Internet Archive.

Technical staff hired to help maintain equipment at overseas facilities were often licensed amateur radio operators. See the attached scans of two QSL cards from amateurs who worked at the station near Monrovia, Liberia.

Most of the various VOA transmitter sites are listed below. Some include links that will lead to related historical information, articles and/or photographs and are well worth exploring.

VOA Greenville NC

VOA Bethany OH

VOA Dixon/Delano CA

VOA Marathon, FL

VOA Wooferton UK

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-shropshire-67133389

VOA Kavala Greece

VOA Thessaloniki Greece

VOA Rhodes, Dodecanese Islands

http://www.theradiohistorian.org/courier/courier.html

VOA Monrovia, Liberia

https://www.africabib.org/rec.php?RID=099870371

VOA Tangier, Morocco

VOA Okinawa, Ryuku Islands

http://jandd.org/photo_gallery/voice_of_america_on_okinawa.htm

VOA Poro/Tinang, Philippines

https://www.radioheritage.com/voice-of-america-relay-station-at-tinang-in-the-philippines/

VOA Udon Thani, Thailand

https://www.udonmap.com/udonthaniforum/viewtopic.php?t=54733

VOA, Sri Lanka

https://mt-shortwave.blogspot.com/2017/03/final-end-of-another-voa-relay-station.html

VOA Sao Tome

VOA Botswana

A year ago, in January 2025, I made a couple of recordings, using remote SDR receivers, of some Voice of America programs being broadcast from their Botswana transmitter site. These have been uploaded to archive.org and can be found here: https://archive.org/details/voa-africa-via-botswana-relay-january-19-2025

Since March 16, 2025, it seems the only former VOA transmitters being used are Greenville, NC (Radio Marti), Tinang, Philippines (Radyo Pilipinas world service), and Wooferton, UK (BBC and others).

Cold War VLF and a Bob’s Homemade “LWL” QSL Card

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Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor Bob (K7ZB), who writes:

Hi Tom,

Bob, K7ZB here, and I was just looking at a post on your SWL site for NSS, the US Navy station which was activated back in 1918.

It brought to mind a very unique QSL card I made for a listening event back in the days that I served on board a Polaris missile submarine during the Cold War.

I created an “LWL” QSL card (I did this tongue-in-cheek) for Long Wave Listening confirmation of TACAMO transmissions sent from a special Hercules C-130 aircraft which was used in the event of nuclear war and the anticipated destruction of all land-based military communications capabilities. TACAMO aircraft are still in use in this system today and aviation enthusiasts track them occasionally.

The National Command Authority would issue commands to launch retaliatory nuclear strikes from our missile subs through the signals sent at VLF 17KHz from the aircraft and received by our boats while submerged.

The system is unclassified (like the Doomsday Machine in ‘Dr Strangelove” of the 1960’s film noir – if it is kept secret it is not a deterrent) so you can read about it here:

https://www.wikiwand.com/en/articles/TACAMO

I was a Missile Technician and Navy SCUBA Diver on a missile boat during the Cold War and had been a ham radio operator (WA8KEX) for 6 years prior to serving on board. When I reported to the submarine, the LPO (Leading Petty Officer) of the Radio gang was also a ham and when I spoke with him he got permission for me to qualify as a Radioman of the Watch so I could stand watches in the radio shack while out at sea on our 75 day patrols in the Mediterranean Sea and above the Arctic Circle. I did that when I was off watch back in the Missile Compartment which was my normal duty staton.

Of course we maintained radio silence during patrols but we could copy VLF when we put out our long trailing floating wire antenna when we were near but below the surface. We could then pick up the transmissions from the TACAMO EC-130Q’s flying in very tight circular patterns just above stall speed with a 5-mile long wire trailing behind them which circled down in a helical form just above the sea somewhere out in the Atlantic.

This allowed the VLF signal to travel great distances and we could then copy it while submerged.

The transmissions were digital with the exception that Morse code was also used back in my day. I served on board the USS Alexander Hamilton SSB(N)617 Gold Crew from 1969-72 for 6 patrols out of Rota, Spain.

I was an MT1(SS)DV, and here is the uniform I wore. I am on the right in the photo of the two divers and with my swim buddy at the US Navy Diver School in Key West, FL (1970), who was a Recon Marine.

I or another RM (Radioman) would strap on headphones and sit at an IBM Selectric ‘mill’ and copy 5-letter code groups sent in International Morse code from a Navy RM up in the aircraft. That RM was working in tough conditions because the C-130’s had to fly at a steep angle approaching 45 degrees which put them at about 1G and they were sending on a straight key at 15wpm.

Once the messages were received I handed them off to the RM’s and then I left for the Missile Compartment because it meant we were going to have a Weapons System Readiness Test soon – a drill in preparation for the real thing.

Which never came, thank God, or we wouldn’t be seeing this email.

The special LWL QSL card I made shows a real C-130 with the antenna spooling out with its counterpoise – you can just see the drogues at the end of the wires – and the middle photo is of the aircraft internal transmitter gear where the signals were sent.

My submarine is shown in the card with our ship’s patch and a pencil sketch of what the radio shack on board an FBM Polaris submarine looked like – the RM with his headphones is sitting at the mill copying TACAMO messages.

I put a small QSL data block on the card detailing some of the conditions of a typical message received as if we had been SWL QSLing a ham station.

I posted this on my submarine’s FB group as well as the FB Submarine Radioman’s group for their enjoyment – if any of them were also hams or SWL’s they would get it immediately.

73,

Bob
K7ZB

Thank you, Bob, for allowing us a glimpse into this chapter of Cold War communications history through your unique LWL QSL. It’s a wonderful blend of personal story, service, and radio heritage.

Paul shares a special QSL card from RTI’s German service

Tom Shares QSL Collection from Over 210 Countries

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Radio Australia from the collection of Tom Gavaras

Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor Tom Gavaras, who recently reached out with an update:

“I want to make you aware that I have posted almost all of my shortwave QSL cards online, representing more than 210 broadcast countries. They can be viewed at: https://radiotapes.com/qsl/”

What an incredible achievement! Tom’s QSL collection spans decades of shortwave radio history and includes verification cards from a vast range of international broadcasters.

Browse the collection here: https://radiotapes.com/qsl/

Thanks again, Tom!

Don Moore’s Photo Album: Guatemala (Part Three)- Guatemala City Continued

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Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor Don Moore–noted author, traveler, and DXer–for the latest installment of his Photo Album guest post series:

Photo Source: Dennis Sylvester Hurd via Wikimedia Commons

Don Moore’s Photo Album:
Guatemala (Part Three) – Guatemala City continued

by Don Moore

More of Don’s traveling DX stories can be found in his book Tales of a Vagabond DXer [SWLing Post affiliate link]. If you’ve already read his book and enjoyed it, do Don a favor and leave a review on Amazon.

When I started DXing in 1971, and for several decades afterwards, the most widely logged Guatemalan shortwave station by DXers was Radio Cultural on 3300 kHz. It was also known as TGNA, the call letters of that 90-meter-band frequency. The medium wave outlet on 730 kHz was TGN. The station also used 5955 kHz and 9505 kHz, but those frequencies were always harder to hear because of interference from more powerful international broadcasters.

Back then this Evangelical broadcaster was owned and operated by the Central American Mission of Dallas, Texas, but only received a portion of its funding from the CAM. Additional funding came from local donations in Guatemala and another important source was selling time to American Evangelical preachers to air their prerecorded English language religious programs. These programs were broadcast late at night, when propagation into North America and Europe was best, and were always preceded by an English station identification. That made it an easier log for DXers who didn’t understand Spanish.

TGNA was the station I most wanted to visit when I arrived in Guatemala City in June 1983. But Guatemala DX Club members informed me that the station had been temporarily closed down because of “philosophical disagreements” with the government. They were off the air and would remain so for several weeks. I made four more visits to Guatemala City over the next year but somehow never found the time to visit the station. It wasn’t until my visit in December 1987 that I finally stepped inside their front door. That visit became the subject of the first article I wrote for Monitoring Times magazine in June 1988.

Wayne Berger, station manager and chief engineer, and missionary Bob Rice gave us a very long tour of the station. Wayne and Bob had built or rebuilt most of the station’s technical equipment and even some of the infrastructure. On the day we arrived they were welding a broken door back on its hinges. Wayne had built the 3300 kHz transmitter, shown in the next picture, out of spare parts.

Main studio control room at TGNA in 1987.

At the time of my visit, TGNA had two pennants. The larger one was mostly reserved for local listeners. The smaller one was sometimes included with QSLs to lucky DXers.

But neither of those compared with these traditional handmade weavings given by listeners for the station’s 37th anniversary in August, 1987. (I just wish my color photos had survived.)

English ID from Radio Cultural, 3300 kHz, as heard in Pennsylvania 23 November 1979 at 0427 UTC:

Radio Cultural, 3300 kHz, as heard in Michigan 23 March 1989 at 1101 UTC:

Easter in Guatemala

Of all the things I’ve seen in my travels, the Easter processions of Guatemala certainly rank near the top. I am fortunate to have been in Guatemala twice for the holiday, in 1982 and 1984, and I plan a return trip in the next few years. Processions take place all over Guatemala during Easter week, but the most elaborate take place on Easter Thursday and Good Friday in Guatemala City and, especially, in Antigua, the old capital twenty kilometers to the west. There are several processions both days in each city and each procession takes several hours. Continue reading →