Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Jacob Brodsky, who shares a link to this excellent, short documentary about the Grimeton Radio Station on YouTube:
Category Archives: Radio History
Don Moore’s Photo Album: Guatemala (Part One) – The East
Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor Don Moore–noted author, traveler, and DXer–for the latest installment of his Photo Album guest post series:
Don Moore’s Photo Album: Guatemala (Part One) – The East
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.
I’ve wanted to do a feature on Guatemala ever since starting this series a few years ago. From a cultural perspective it’s one of the most fascinating countries in Latin America. About half the population are indigenous, primarily Mayan, and most of them still speak their own languages. For several decades Guatemala’s religious broadcasters – Roman Catholic and Evangelical Protestant – used many of those languages on shortwave where we DXers were able to hear them.
I made five visits to Guatemala from 1982 to 1984 while in the Peace Corps in Honduras and returned in December 1987 while in graduate school. I spent enough time in Guatemala that there’s an entire section of my Vagabond DXer book filled with stories of my travels and station visits. In this seven-part series you get to see the pictures.
The map below shows the country, minus the sparsely populated northern department of Petén. We’re going to start in the least interesting part of Guatemala, the east. There’s very little indigenous culture left in that region nor much else of interest to the visitor. But you do have to pass through it to get from Honduras to the rest of Guatemala … and there were some radio stations to visit.
The main border crossing between Honduras and Guatemala has always been near Esquipulas in southern Chiquimula department. (That’s where the header photo comes from). But about 40 kilometers to the north is a secondary crossing near the town of Jocotán. In the 1980s, the road was rough and unpaved and the best mode of transportation was hitching a ride in the back of a passing pickup truck. The border consisted of just two wooden shacks, one on each side, minded by bored soldiers. That’s where I entered Guatemala on my second visit in June 1983. Jocotán had a radio station that I wanted to visit.
Eastern Guatemala may not have had much of interest, but the large Mayan ruins of Copán are just across the border in Honduras. The most direct route there from Guatemala City is via Jocotán so typically a few backpackers pass through town every day. I found a room at the Pension Ramirez. At $1.50 a night it was the perfect place for Peace Corps Volunteers, backpackers, and others at the very bottom end of the budget travel scale. I got a bed with sheets that may have been washed within the past week, a table, a chair, and a dim light bulb hanging from the ceiling. The shared bathroom was down the hall. Cold water only. But the Pension Ramirez had one thing that I never encountered at any other such lodging. The owner had a business card.
Jocotán was home to Radio Chortís, a Roman Catholic broadcaster that mostly ministered to the Chortí Indians who lives in the region. As most of the Chortí had assimilated into the dominant Spanish culture the station primarily broadcast in Spanish with just a few hours in the Chortí language each week. Radio Chortís used to put a strong signal into North America on 3380 kHz. The station was part of a mission funded by donations from Belgian and West German Catholics. The studios and offices were in a large complex that also included vocational training facilities and a print shop for the church. That explained why the back of their QSL letters always had a colorful station graphic.
Radio Chortís, 3380 kHz, as heard in Pennsylvania 30 December 1979 at 1152 UTC:
Audio PlayerOn to Cobán
Early the next morning, I took a bus to Chiquimula, the departmental capital. DXers may recognize the town as the location of Radio Verdad, the last active shortwave broadcast station in Central America. It came on the air long after my time there so I never got to visit the station. In Chiquimula I switched to a bus bound for Guatemala City, but that wasn’t my final destination. I got off at a little crossroads just before the town of El Progreso and then boarded the next bus heading north to Cobán, capital of Alta Verapaz.
In Cobán I planned to visit another Catholic broadcaster, but one with a rather unusual name for a religious station. In the 1520s, the Spanish conquistadores quickly overran most of Guatemala but the Kekchi Indians in their mountainous homeland proved impossible to defeat. The Spanish dubbed the region Tezulutlán from an archaic Spanish phrase that meant “Land of War.”
In the 1540s, the Spanish tried another method to subdue the region, this time allowing Dominican friars under Bartolomé de las Casas to attempt to convert the Kekchi to Catholicism. Where the soldiers had failed the padres succeeded and the newly pacified region was renamed Verapaz, or Land of True Peace. Bartolomé de las Casas was a good man who left a legacy of trying to protect the rights of the Indians in a time of brutal conquest. But he was just one man in a time of boundless greed. He left the region a few years later and the Kekchi were forced into peonage just as the Mayans elsewhere in Guatemala had been.
And so four centuries later when the Roman Catholic diocese in Verapaz, the land of true peace, set up a radio station they named it Radio Tezulutlán, after the land of war. Someone had a keen sense of irony. But maybe there is something symbolic there as well. The Kekchi, after all, have survived as a people with their own language intact. Today they number over half-a-million, or almost eight percent of the Guatemalan people. That Radio Tezulutlán broadcasts primarily in Kekchi, not Spanish, might just be a final victory for the Kekchi.
The next few pictures show the Radio Tezulutlán building and studio from 1983 and the QSL card and pennant that I picked up on my visit. The QSL was for their little-used frequency of 3370 kHz. They mostly used 4835 kHz.
Radio Tezulutlán, 4835 kHz, as heard in Pennsylvania on 24 December 1979 at 1153 UTC:
Audio PlayerMore Broadcasters in Verapaz
In Santa Bárbara, Honduras, where I was living in 1983, one of the best heard Guatemalan medium wave stations was Cobán’s Radio Norte on 680 kHz. I stopped by in the evening hoping to pick up a QSL but the only person there was a lone announcer who was too busy to help me. I may not have gotten the QSL but I did pick up something that I’ve since come to see as even more valuable.
In my book, I explain how one of the primary sources of income for small town radio stations in that era was reading personal announcements and greetings on the air. The Radio Norte announcer had a stack of forms that listeners had filled out with messages to be read on the air. He was throwing away some that had already been read, so I took one.
The form could be either mailed to the station or hand-delivered, as this one apparently was. The message is a birthday greeting from Imelda to her son Mario Agusto. At the top, the date the message is to be read is listed and the place is listed as San Juan Chamelco. This is important as the announcer would first say something like “Atención! San Juan Chamelco!” to get the attention of listeners in that town. At the bottom are instructions as to when the announcement should be read – the 18:30 marimba music show. The form is a very unique radio station souvenir. I only wish I had taken the entire pile out of the trashcan.
Radio Norte, 680 kHz, recorded in Cobán during my June 1983 visit:
Audio PlayerI also made a side trip to the neighboring town of San Pedro Carchá where I got a sort-of-QSL from Radio Imperial on 925 kHz. If you’ve read my book you know that a picture of the secretary would be a lot more interesting than this one of the front door.
A New Shortwave Station
For thirteen years the Roman Catholic church and Radio Tezulutlán had the Kekchi language airwaves all to themselves. But Evangelical Protestantism had been gaining ground in Guatemala for several decades and in 1988 the Evangelical station Radio Kekchi began broadcasting on the shortwave frequency of 4845 kHz. Radio Kekchi must have had friends at the Ministry of Communication as that assigned frequency was just 10 kHz above Radio Tezulutlán’s 4835 kHz. That certainly made it easier to poach listeners from the competition.
In one more bit of strangeness, Radio Kekchi was located sixty-five kilometers northeast of Cobán in the town of Fray Bartolomé de las Casas. So the Evangelical radio station was put in a place named after the priest who originally converted the Kekchi to Catholicism. Maybe the region should be renamed The Land of Irony.
Radio Kekchí, 4845 kHz, as heard in Ohio on 5 September 1988:
Audio PlayerLanguage or Dialect?
In much of the common literature about Guatemala it says that the indigenous people speak Mayan dialects. And back in the day when these stations were active on shortwave, DXers’ loggings often referred to hearing Mayan dialects. But I called Chortí and Kekchi languages, not dialects. What’s the difference?
Linguistically, a dialect is a regional variation of a language. The different dialects of a language are always mutually intelligible. American and Britons speak different dialects of English but have no trouble understanding one another except for the occasional confusion over a word or phrase. Speakers of Spanish and Portuguese can understand one another a little bit but not enough to have a real conversation. Those are distinct languages.
On the other hand, Danes, Norwegians, and Swedes have no trouble carrying on a conversation with each speaking their own language. That’s because linguistically they are speaking dialects of the same language. So why are Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish considered different languages? Linguist Max Weinrich once explained “a language is a dialect with an army and a navy.” He might have added an economy, a government, and international respect.
Languages spoken by people who are held in low prestige are often called dialects not for any linguistic reason but simply out of prejudice. It’s a subtle way of indicating these people and their culture are of less importance. This is true not only of Guatemala’s indigenous languages but of many others around the world. Chortí, Kekchi, Quiché, Cakchiquel, and all the other two dozen indigenous languages of Guatemala are just as distinct from one another as are Spanish, French, and Italian. So show them some respect. Call them languages, not dialects.
A DX Oddity
Let’s end part one of this series with an unusual bit of radio history. Aeronautical beacons are stations that broadcast a short morse code identifier over and over. Pilots use them for direction finding in lining up with the runway during bad weather. Today these are only found in the longwave band but there used to be a handful of Latin American beacons on frequencies just above the old top of the medium wave band. One of those was RAB on 1613 kHz at Rabinal, about 45 kilometers south of Cobán. It used to be an easy catch all over North America, but here’s a recording I made of it in nearby Honduras.
Beacon RAB, 1613 kHz, as heard in Santa Bárbara, Honduras, on 12 November 1982 at 0508 UTC:
Audio PlayerNext: Part Two – Guatemala City
Links
- Facebook page for Radio Chortí (at some point they dropped the ‘s’ from the name). The station is now FM only.
- Facebook page for Radio Tezulutlán, now on FM only.
- Facebook page for Radio Kekchi, now on FM only.
- Wikipedia Article with Map on the Languages of Guatemala
- Languages versus Dialects
- The Sociolinguistics of Guatemalan Indian Languages and the Effect on Radio Broadcasting is a paper I wrote in 1989 while doing my M.A. in Applied Linguistics at Ohio University.
- The border crossing near Jocotán today on Google Street View. The road has been paved and it’s now busy with traffic.
First Look Inside the Updated and Upgraded VOA Museum
Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor David, who shares the following news items via WVXU and Spectrum News:
A first look inside the renovated VOA Broadcasting Museum (WVXU)
Visitors to the National Voice of America Museum of Broadcasting in West Chester Township will notice the first improvement immediately after turning into the driveway off Tylersville Road.
New pavement covers the old potholes.
That’s just one of many enhancements at the 1942 VOA building thanks to $500,000 from the state of Ohio. The museum reopens this weekend (Jan. 25-26) after a seven-month renovation with a reconfigured exhibition space, more TV monitors, a revamped Cincinnati broadcasting area, and new lighting, carpeting, drop ceilings, and heating and air conditioning systems.
“It’s now beginning to look like a real museum. This is a major, major, major, major infrastructure improvement,” says Jack Dominic, museum executive director.
“This changes everything. We’ve got heat and air conditioning, and carpeting everywhere. We now have a building that is up to code and able to be a welcoming place for all visitors. We don’t have to apologize any more.” [Continue reading…]
New sounds, exhibits shine at the National VOA Museum of Broadcasting (Spectrum News)
CINCINNATI — These days, it’s easy to take communication technology for granted.
We open our phones and there’s the daily news. We get in our car and we’re connected to any type of programming imaginable, and our devices can bring us just about any livestream from across the world at a moment’s notice.
However, it wasn’t all that long ago that communication was a lot different.
After a six-month closure for renovations, the National Voice of America Museum of Broadcasting is back open.
“We kind of call it the ‘Cincinnati Wing’ and it’s kind of a history of broadcasting in Cincinnati going all the way back to Powel Crosley,” said the museum’s Executive Director Jack Dominic as he gave a tour. [Continue reading…]
Don Moore’s Photo Album: Museum Findings – World War II
Don Moore’s Photo Album
Museum Findings: World War II
by Don Moore
More of Don’s traveling DX stories can be found in his book Tales of a Vagabond DXer.
Learning should be a life-long pursuit for all of us. One of my ways of doing that is by visiting museums while traveling, whether in the USA or abroad. Cultural, historical, and science museums are my favorites. And if a museum’s theme includes the 20th century, there is a good chance that something related to radio will be found in the collection. In this edition of the Photo Album I want to share some findings related to radio and World War II that I’ve recently found in museums here in the USA.
Do A-Bombs QSL?
I’m based in Pennsylvania but my daughter lives in western Colorado and my son in Texas. So in September and October of 2024 I made a 45-day road trip to visit them both and see sites along the way. One stop was Santa Fe, New Mexico. The New Mexico History Museum downtown has an excellent exhibit on the development of the Atomic Bomb and the effect on the local area. The real place to learn about this, however, is an hour north of the city at Los Alamos, where the project actually happened.
In addition to the historical sites, Los Alamos has one of the best science museums I’ve been to anywhere. That’s not surprising considering that not many places have as many scientists per capita as Los Alamos does. And there I learned that radio was closely involved in dropping the first A-Bomb on Hiroshima.
The scientists at Los Alamos developed two types of atomic bombs. The bomb dropped on Hiroshima used a uranium-gun to initiate the explosion. The scientists were certain this would work so this was not tested beforehand. The bomb dropped on Nagasaki used the second method with a with a plutonium-implosion as the trigger. But they were uncertain as to whether or not this would actually work so it had already been tested in the New Mexico desert in July 1945. That was the first atomic explosion and the scientists collected lots of useful measurements.
But the developers had no such measurements for the uranium-gun bomb as it hadn’t been tested. But how to get them? They obviously couldn’t place monitors on the ground at Hiroshima beforehand. Physicist Luis Alvarez was tasked with finding a solution. Alvarez’s team built three canisters filled with monitoring equipment and VHF transmitters to be carried by The Great Artiste, the observation plane that would accompany the Enola Gay to Hiroshima. The three canisters were to be dropped by parachute at the same moment that the Enola Gay dropped the bomb.
The signals from the canisters were to be picked up by a bank of Hallicrafters S-36 VHF receivers on the plane and then feed to oscillographs to record the results, which would simultaneously be recorded by movie cameras.
It all worked according to plan and data was received from two of the three canisters before they were engulfed by the explosion. But, to the best of my knowledge, no QSLs were issued for the receptions.
The WASP Museum
My next destination after Santa Fe was San Antonio, Texas, 700 miles (1100 kilometers) away. To make the road trip more interesting I wanted to find some things to see along the way. While perusing Google Maps I came across the National WASP World War II Museum in Sweetwater, Texas. The museum has nothing to do with insects. The acronym stands for Women’s Airforce Service Pilots.
The use of women pilots in support roles to the US Army Air Force began in 1942 with the Women’s Flying Training Detachment (WFTD) and Women’s Auxiliary Ferrying Squadron (WAFS). In 1943 the two programs were merged to form the WASP program and the airfield at Sweetwater was chosen for the four-month training program. In total, 1,830 women started WASP training and 1,074 finished, about the same success rate as with male military pilots of the era. Continue reading
Carlos Explores Japan’s Radio Nikkei: A Unique Shortwave Listening Experience from Brazil
Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor Carlos Latuff, who shares the following guest post:
Exploring Radio Radio Nikkei
by Carlos Latuff
It’s been a while since I listened to Nikkei Radio, a Japanese commercial broadcaster that operates on shortwave for a domestic audience. If I remember well, the signal was very weak and, since I don’t speak Japanese, I didn’t know what the content of its broadcasts was about. But today, with the possibility of recording the audio, transcribing it and translating it, it has become more interesting to follow its programs on shortwave here in Brazil, more specifically in Porto Alegre (distance between Nikkei’s transmitter in Chiba, Japan, and Porto Alegre, Brazil: 18779 km).
Nikkei Radio 1 was founded in 1954 and Nikkei 2 in 1963, and at the time it was called Nihon Shortwave Broadcasting Co., better known by the acronym “NSB”. Some Japanese electronics manufacturers have in the past released receivers dedicated to receiving the signal from these stations (see below).
Today, the Japanese company Audiocomm has radio models whose packaging states that this receiver is compatible with Nikkei Radio; note the image alluding to horse racing (see below).
I haven’t been able to acquire any of these devices (yet), since they were basically produced for the Japanese public. But any receiver with shortwave bands can tune into Radio Nikkei. I use my good old XHDATA D-808 with a long wire antenna. In Porto Alegre, the best propagation is between 08:45 AM and 06:15 AM (UTC). In the late afternoon, the signal also arrives, but with a fair amount of static.
Both Radio Nikkei 1 and Radio Nikkei 2 operate on the following frequencies:
Radio Nikkei 1:
- 3.925 MHz (in case of emergency)
- 6.055 MHz
- 9.595 MHz (in case of emergency)
Radio Nikkei 2:
- 3.945 MHz (in case of emergency)
- 6.115 MHz
- 9.76 MHz: (in case of emergency)
On the station’s website https://www.radionikkei.jp/ you can find details of its programming, as well as broadcast times, including a table (in Japanese) with this information, which can be translated with the help of Google Lens.
Radio Nikkei also broadcasts its programming via streaming, however the platform used (radiko) is inaccessible to me here in Brazil (see message below).
Nikkei Radio is majority-owned by the business newspaper Nihon Keizai Shimbun and the Tokyo Stock Exchange, which means the station focuses mainly on the financial market. However, much of its programming, especially on weekends, is dedicated to horse racing, a popular sport in Japan. In addition to news, talk shows and music, the radio station also broadcasts evangelical preaching (!). One of these religious programs is called “True Salvation” and is sponsored by The Japan Gospel Mission, a Christian Protestant organization.
This heterogeneous mix of business, horses and Jesus Christ makes Nikkei Radio an interesting station to tune into, to say the least.
The radio listening sessions published here were made in the central Porto Alegre, Brazil, between January 15th and 19th, 2025.
(Domo arigato gozai masu Mr. Tagawa Shigeru for helping me with translation).
Click here to view on YouTube.
Click here to view on YouTube.
Click here to view on YouTube.
Click here to view on YouTube.
Video Short: Tuning In Radio Nikkei 1
Part of Radio Nikkei 1 program “Health Network”, in Japanese. Topic: Winter diet and health. Listened in Porto Alegre, Brazil.
From NDBs to TIS: A DXer’s Journey Across 1610-1700 kHz
Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor Dan Greenall, who shares the following guest post and asks, “Wonder who can add to this list?“:
A Look Back – DXing between 1610 and 1700 kHz
by Dan Greenall
1. The Caribbean Beacon, Anguilla West Indies 1610 kHz (1985 QSL)
2. NDB stations (non-directional beacons)
- transmitted call letters on CW, mostly from airports, heard in the 1970’s
- examples: MDE Medellin, Colombia 1690 kHz and RAB Rabinal, Guatemala 1613 kHz
3. U.S. Army Broadcasting Service KTRK 1670 Fort Meade, MD Feb 1996 articles and recordings
https://www.radioheritage.com/ktrk-k-truck-1670-khz/
4. FCC Part 15 Radio Stations
Example: WDKW 1630 “the Klaw” Dundalk High School near Baltimore, MD
Audio PlayerLink to my recording made at a DX camp in Coe Hill, Ontario, Canada on April 20, 1997: https://archive.org/details/wdkw-the-klaw-1630
An internet search revealed the following;
Part 15 of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) rules allows some low-powered radio devices to operate without a license on the AM and FM radio broadcast bands. These devices are subject to certain restrictions, including:
- Range: On FM frequencies, the effective service range is limited to about 200 feet (61 meters).
- Field strength: The field strength should not exceed 250 ?V/m (48db) at 3 meters.
- Detachable antennas: Part 15 rules prohibit detachable antennas on all Part 15 transmitters.
Some examples of Part 15 radio stations include:
- Microbroadcasting
Often used by hobbyists, drive-in theaters, or on college or high school campuses.
- Talking roadsigns, talking houses, or talking billboards
These transmitters air a repeating loop of information, such as traffic or highway construction. They typically operate on empty channels on the AM broadcast band.
- InfOspot
A custom product that can include special audio systems, USB / internet connectivity, cabinets, and antenna mounting styles.
- Free-radiate AM radio stations
Educational institutions can use a transmitter without a license if the signal coverage is limited to their property.
5. TIS (Travellers Information Stations)
1610 kHz with low power, usually around 10 watts, such as the one I hear near the Blue Water Bridge between Sarnia, Ontario and Port Huron, Michigan
6. Expanded AM broadcast band
Over a quarter century ago, these frequencies began to be used in the U.S. by BCB stations. I still have recordings of a half dozen of these from the early days.
WTDY 1670:
Audio PlayerWNML 1670:
Audio PlayerWMDM 1690:
Audio PlayerKCNZ 1650:
Audio PlayerKCJJ 1630:
Audio PlayerKBGG 1700:
Audio PlayerAlso, here is a link to a column in Popular Communications magazine from February 1998.
Rediscovering the Golden Age of Utility DXing
Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Dan Greenall, who writes:
Hi Thomas
Back in the 1970’s, I used to enjoy hunting for “utility” radio stations outside the regular SWBC bands. When I came across a copy of the Utility DXer’s Handbook from 1971 recently on eBay, I couldn’t resist purchasing it. I have since made a page on archive.org for it to help preserve this unique piece of radio history. Anyone interested can follow this link and take a look at the world of utility radio as it was over 50 years ago.
Also, I have included links to some of the recordings and QSL’s from these stations that I have set up on the Internet Archive.
-
- The Utility DXer’s Handbook (1971)
- Vintage PTT stations 1970’s part 1
- Vintage PTT stations 1970’s part 2
- Vintage PTT stations 1970’s part 3
- A.T. and T. voice mirrors 1970’s
- Cable and Wireless voice mirrors 1970’s
- Tropical Radio Telegraph Company voice mirrors 1970’s
- France Cables and Radio Company (Africa) 1970’s
- French Telecommunications Service 1970’s
- Utility Radio QSL cards
- Utility Radio QSL letters
- Prepared Form Card (PFC) QSL’s
Wow, Dan! What a utility DXing treasure trove you’ve created on Archive.org. Thank you for sharing these resources and recordings with us!