Tag Archives: Radio Canada International

Spectres of Shortwave: Streaming free online May 26 – June 1, 2020

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Many thanks to Amanda Dawn Christie, who notes that Spectres of Shortwave is once again viewable online:

Hi Thomas, the [Spectres of Shortwave] video is freely viewable online for a week now. The link just went live this week, hosted by Daziabo gallery… feel free to share!

It will be freely available to stream from 10am May 26 – 6pm June 1 on this site:

https://en.dazibao.art/online

Thank you Amanda!

My apologies to those of you who tried viewing the film online from a link in a previous post.  Though it was shared widely, it turns out that link wasn’t meant to be public yet. Apologies for that!

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Spectres of Shortwave: Amanda Dawn Christie’s film about RCI Sackville now streaming

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IMPORTANT UPDATE – Amanda Dawn Christie notes:

“Unfortunately [this video] was never supposed to be public – it was an accident on my part. The film will be viewable soon though, for seven days. May 26 to June 1. It is being hosted by a gallery in Montreal. That upload was only a test for them, and should never have been public. I was in a hurry, trying to get it uploaded before I packed my hard drives before I moved and I guess I didn’t check all the settings. Sorry about that. I appreciate the enthusiasm though.”

SWLing Post friend and filmmaker, Amanda Dawn Christie, has just uploaded a version of her film Spectres of Shortwave to Vimeo where it can be viewed free of charge:

Click here to watch on Vimeo.

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Radio Canada International at 75 years

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(Source: RCI.net via David Iurescia)

Today is an auspicious day for RCI. It was February 25, 1945 that the CBC International Service began shortwave broadcasting to Europe. It was designed at the time to provide accurate news to occupied areas in

English French and German, and to provide news from home for the huge contingent of Canadian military personnel serving and fighting in the Second World War.

Since then the “IS” has gone through a variety of changes, including the name which was changed to Radio Canada International in 1970. It has been through several moves, from its first location in a former brothel, to the converted Ford Hotel a few years later, to rented office tower space, to the main headquarters of the French service, Radio-Canada.

It has also gone through a number of language-service changes, from 14 languages during the cold war broadcasting to formerly free countries then under the control of Moscow, to its current five languages, Mandarin, Spanish, Arabic, English and French.

Other changes include the drastic cuts of 2012 which saw some 80 per cent of staff cut and the cessation of shortwave to become its current online operation.

Throughout it all RCI continues to inform on Canadian issues including political, scientific, cultural and societal and provide Canadian viewpoints and positions on world affairs.

Click here to read the full article at RCI.net.

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Former RCI Sackville transmitter site’s “slow transformation”

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Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, David Iurescia (LW4DAF), who writes:

[Here’s] an interesting article about former RCI transmitter site (Sackville):

Former RCI transmitter site – slow transformation
By Marc Montgomery

The former RCI transmitter site near Sackville New Brunswick, sold to a First Nations group, is now in the process of being absorbed into native reserve land and some as yet undetermined use.

During the Second World War as Canada was working towards creating a shortwave service, an ideal site for the transmission of radio signals was found in New Brunswick. Located on the Tantramar marshes, it was ideal ground for propagation of signals from the complex array of antenna wires and towers.

The service was ended over six decades later as a result of severe budget cuts in 2012. The site was later purchased by Mi’kmaq First Nations in 2017 and plans are slowly taking shape to transform the 90 acre site into reserve land. That process involves consultations with neighbouring municipalities, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, the New Brunswick provincial government and other indigenous communities. It’s expected to take two years, during which time the Mi’kmaq will decide the use for the land, whether cultural or economic or a combination.[…]

Click here to read the full article and view photos at RCI.

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IEEE Spectrum Magazine: “This Artist Made a Radio Out of a Kitchen Sink”

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(Source: IEEE Spectrum via Ed C)

Amanda Dawn Christie’s work commemorates the fading glory of shortwave radio

By Stephen Cass

Some artists work in oils, say, or marble. Amanda Dawn Christie works in radio. Not radio in the sense of performing on air. But radio in the sense of the giant cultural and technological phenomenon that is broadcasting, and specifically shortwave broadcasting.

For decades, shortwave was the only way to reach a global audience in real time. Broadcasters such as the BBC World Service and Voice of America used it to project “soft power.” But as the Internet grew, interest in shortwave diminished.

Christie’s art draws from shortwave’s history, representing it in sculpture, performance, photography, and film. Her focus is the life of the Radio Canada International (RCI) transmitter complex, located in Sackville, New Brunswick, near Christie’s hometown. The transmitter was in operation from the 1940s until 2012. “Those towers were always just a part of the landscape that I grew up around,” says Christie. It took a radio-building workshop to spark her interest: “I built a radio out of a toilet-paper tube…. I thought I did a great job because I picked up Italian radio. It turned out I did not—I was just really close to this international shortwave site.”[…]

Continue reading the full article at the IEEE Spectrum Magazine.

So great to see SWLing Post friend, Amanda Dawn Christie, featured in the IEEE Spectrum! Thanks for the tip, Ed!

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Shortwave Radio Recordings: SWL Digest from January 4, 1982

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Do you miss Ian McFarland on Radio Canada International?

Yeah, me too.

That’s why I’m always pleased to receive off air recordings from Shortwave Radio Audio Archive contributor, Tom Laskowski.

I’ve just posted his latest off-air recording on the archive and thought I’d post it here as well. Tom note:

Here is another one of my many recordings of Shortwave Listener’s Digest from Radio Canada International, this time from January 4, 1982. This program highlights are: Glenn Hauser with his Year in Review for the previous year of 1981; part 1. Larry Magne with a test report for the Panasonic RF-9000 which listed at $US 3800!!!. The program ends with Glenn Hauser’s second part of his review of the previous year’s highlights. Unfortunately the broadcast suffers from some adjacent-channel interference.

Starting time: 2130 UTC on January 4, 1982

Frequency: 15.325 MHz

Receiver location: South Bend, Indiana

Receiver: Realistic DX-302

Click here to download this MP3 audio.

If you enjoy off-air recordings, check out some of the recent ones on the archive which include:

Thanks again, Tom, and thanks to the dozens of contributors that make the shortwave archive such a treasure trove of shortwave history!

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Blueprints, maps, and test equipment: RCI Sackville items for sale

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I snapped this photo inside the RCI Sackville transmitter site in 2012, a few months prior to its closure.

Earlier this year, we posted a note by Marc Goldstein who is in the process of dismantling the Radio Canada International Sackville, New Brunswick, transmitter building.

Marc is tasked with selling some of the equipment that used to make this site hum. The First Nations group who now own the site are using the revenue from sales to help fund site cleanup and renovation.  Mark recently passed along the following note:

We are trying to determine the value of the large quantity of 1940 era engineering blue prints of the station. I hoping your readers will be able to establish their worth.

While rummaging through an old file cabinet in maintenance building (RCI Sackville, New Brunswick), we located about a 100 or so more engineering blue prints (1938-1945), about a dozen black and white photos (RCI reporters interviewing what appears to be world celebrities), and annual engineering reports (1938-1980). Would any of these items be of interest to your readers?

Post readers: If you are interested in any of these items, Marc can be contacted via the following email address: [email protected]. He is open to offers and happy to ship these items internationally.

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