Category Archives: AM

George Stein’s connection to the 1906 Fessenden Christmas Eve broadcast

Reginald Aubrey Fessenden (October 6, 1866 – July 22, 1932)

Some of you may recall that last year, I posted an announcement about WG2XFQ; this station annually airs Brian Justin’s longwave broadcast honoring Reginald Fessenden’s famous Christmas Eve’n 1906 AM voice transmission. I had been lucky enough to capture a recording of this commemorative event on WG2XFQ in 2013.

Just yesterday, I was contacted by SWLing Post reader, George Stein (NJ3H), who had just discovered my recording–and, in turn, shared his own recording of the WG2XFQ transmission. In George’s message, he casually mentioned that he has a close family link to the original Fessenden Christmas Eve broadcast, which I find of great interest. George writes:

“My grandfather, Adam Stein, Jr., was Fessenden’s chief engineer and was present for the Christmas Eve broadcast from Brant Rock, Mass in 1906. He is also mentioned in the Fessenden biography by Helen Fessenden, of which I have a copy…

In scientific journals from that time…it was reported that my grandfather’s voice was the first heard across the Atlantic (Machrahanish, Scotland) in Nov/Dec 1906. This occurred during testing at Brant Rock and was picked up by Fessenden’s man in Scotland.”

All I can say is, Wow! This is an amazing bit of history. Of course, I sent a reply to George asking for more information and permission to post this, which he kindly granted. George continues with an excerpt from S. Belrose, Communications Research Centre Canada:

“In November 1906, Fessenden and colleagues were conducting experimental transmissions using his newly-developed HF alternator, between stations at Brant Rock and Plymouth, Massachusetts. The station at Brant Rock was modulated by a carbon microphone connected in series with the antenna lead.

About midnight, on an evening early in November, Mr. Stein was telling the operator at Plymouth how to run the dynamo. His voice was heard by Mr. Armor at the Macrihanish, Scotland station with such clarity that there was no doubt about the speaker, and the station log book confirmed the report.

Fessenden’s greatest triumph was soon to come. On 24 December, 1906, Fessenden and his assistants presented the world’s first radio broadcast. The transmission included a speech by Fessenden and selected music for Christmas. Fessenden played Handel’s Largo on the violin. That first broadcast, from his transmitter at Brant Rock, MA, was heard by radio operators on board US Navy and United Fruit Company ships equipped with Fessenden’s radio receivers at various distances over the South and North Atlantic, as far away as the West Indies. The wireless broadcast was repeated on New Year’s Eve.”

The Brant Rock staff and operators: Fessenden is seated in the middle and to his right is his son (Reginald Kennelly), holding Mikums, his cat. Mr. Pannill is on the far left. Standing next to him is Jessie Bent, the secretary. Mr. Stein is on the far right. (Radioscientist)

[Above] A picture of Fessenden’s team at Brant Rock, Mass in 1906. Radio pioneer Charles Pannill is shown in the picture. My grandfather, Adam Stein, Jr., who was Fessenden’s chief engineer, is also shown in the picture.

A postcard showing Fessenden’s wireless antenna in 1906 at Brant Rock.

George continues:

In December 2006, a special event amateur radio station, W1F, was on the air from Brant Rock to commemorate 100 years since Fessenden’s Christmas Eve and New Year’s Eve broadcasts. Stephan Barreres, K2CX, put a team together for the special event. I was fortunate to be included with the fine team he had assembled.

All that remains of the Fessenden antenna is the tower base.

The picture was taken in Dec 2006, with NJ3H standing in front.

The plaque on the base was provided on the 60th anniversary of the 1906 broadcast.

NJ3H at the operating position of W1F, 30 December 2006

The following is George’s audio and screen cast while he received the Christmas Eve reenactment broadcast on 25 December 2013; WG2XFQ broadcast from Forest, VA by WA1ZMS, this recording was made by George in Stephens City, VA on a Microtelecom Perseus SDR and a Wellbrook loop.

For those of you not familiar with Reginald Fessenden, I encourage you to read about him; he was a Canadian inventor who performed pioneering experiments in radio, including the use of continuous waves (CW) and the early—and arguably the first—radio transmissions of voice and music. Check out some of our archived posts on Fessenden and read more about him at this online Fessenden museum.

George, again, many thanks for sharing a little history about your grandfather and your own way of honoring his work.

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Dashtoons: Über cool radio art by Jeff K1NSS

Jeff gives the CCRadio 2E a favorable review

And now, the Shipping Forecast…

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When I lived in the UK, I would often fall asleep and/or wake up to the Shipping Forecast: a BBC Radio broadcast of weather reports and forecasts for the seas around the coasts of the British Isles.

Though I had, of course, no real need of the Forecast, on many occasions it lured me like the voice of a hypnotic siren (especially, I must admit, when read by a woman). When I moved back to the US in 2003, I missed hearing the Forecast on the radio, but thankfully one can listen to it at Radio 4 online. Although the online stream lacks the delectable sonic texture of long wave radio, the Forecast still has the power can still reel in its listeners.

Last December, I followed a brilliant series on NPR which highlighted the BBC Shipping Forecast. I intended to publish it here on the SWLing Post at the time, but somehow lost it in the shuffle of a busy travel season. Fortunately, NPR has archived audio from the series online. I love their introduction:

“It is a bizarre nightly ritual that is deeply embedded in the British way of life.

You switch off the TV, lock up the house, slip into bed, turn on your radio, and begin to listen to a mantra, delivered by a soothing, soporific voice.

“Viking, North Utsire, South Utsire, Forties, Cromarty, Forth, Tyne, Dogger ….” says the voice.

You are aware — vaguely — that these delicious words are names, and that those names refer to big blocks of sea around your island nation, stretching all the way up to Iceland and down to North Africa.

The BBC’s beloved Shipping Forecast bulletin covers 31 sea areas, the names of which have inspired poets, artists and singers and become embedded into the national psyche.

Your mind begins to swoop across the landscape, sleepily checking the shorelines, from the gray waters of the English Channel to the steely turbulence of the Atlantic.

Somewhere, deep in your memory, stir echoes of British history — of invasions from across the sea by Vikings, Romans and Normans; of battles with Napoleon’s galleons and Hitler’s U-boats.

Finally, as the BBC’s Shipping Forecast bulletin draws to a close, you nod off, complacent in the knowledge that whatever storms are blasting away on the oceans out there, you’re in your pajamas, sensibly tucked up at home”

You can listen to the series on NPR, or via the embedded player below:

Click here to listen to the Shipping Forecast on the BBC Radio 4 website. Also, check out the history of the Shipping Forecast on Wikipedia and from this excellent article by Peter Jefferson in Prospero (PDF, page 10).

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This Panasonic RF-2200 will help you weather a storm

Drew’s CB Tapes

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SWLing Post reader, Chris, writes:

“I found this web page that my be of interest to your blog readers. A guy named Drew Durigan has saved CB radio audio of himself talking to his friends when he was a teenager in the 1970’s. Its mostly kids talking smack about each other with CB radios, kind of like kids do today with text messages and facebook. The web page is called Radio Geek Heaven.”

http://radiogeekheaven.com/cb-radio/cb-radio-tapes/

Note that Drew has also posted numerous FM/AM air checks on Radio Geek Heaven as well–a lot of good audio to dig through.

Thanks for sharing, Chris!

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WSJ: “FCC Agents Trace Radio Interference”

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Poorly engineered fluorescent ballasts are oftern culprits of broad spectrum radio interference. (Image: HowStuffWorks.com)

Poorly engineered fluorescent ballasts are often culprits of broad spectrum radio interference. (Image: HowStuffWorks.com)

I’m happy to see RFI being mentioned in the Wall Street Journal.

Many thanks to SWLing Post reader, Ulis, for the tip:

(Source: Wall Street Journal)

A federal agent who shows up unannounced at a building along a Texas highway might be looking for any number of things: illicit drugs or immigration violations, say, or illegal firearms.

Or fluorescent lights.

Which was what the agent had in mind who walked into the Perfect Cuts salon in San Antonio last July. The lights were violating communications regulations.

The agent had used signal-tracking equipment to home in on the offenders and told the owner, Ronald Bethany, that his lights emitted radio signals that interfered with an AT&T cellphone tower.

[…]The mixed signals aren’t always so weighty. In recent years, the FCC has issued warning letters directing people to stop operating cordless phones, television sets and wireless cameras.

[…]The FCC can demand fines up to $16,000 a day or $112,500 an incident from people who aren’t FCC licensees. Offenders usually rectify problems, the FCC says, often working them out with whomever is complaining.

Managing the radio spectrum “has been part of our core mission since the inception of the FCC in 1934,” says Julius Knapp, head of the agency’s Office of Engineering and Technology.

[…]The government doesn’t much care why interference happens. To the FCC, noise is noise.

In a 2013 letter, the FCC wrote to the owner of a plasma TV set after a ham-radio operator complained to the agency of interference. “Continued operation of the television,” warned the letter, from which the TV owner’s identification is redacted, “is not legal under FCC rules.”

[…]Ham-radio operators are a frequent source of complaints. A 2012 FCC letter told a Pomona Park, Fla., resident to stop using a well pump that conflicted with amateur-radio frequencies.

[…]Radio hobbyist Tom Thompson of Boulder, Colo., last year tracked a signal using a homemade contraption. After knocking on the suspect’s door, he traced it to ballasts on marijuana grow-room lights. He says he built a filter that the grower agreed to use.

Ballasts are frequent offenders. Makers of the components, which regulate electricity to bulbs, test them for FCC compliance. Some interfere anyway.[…]