Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Kris Partridge, who shares the following note following our recent series of posts about WWII radio:
The, nearly, full story of the BBC’s wartime reporting can be found here. Yes, I hope another interesting read both for your good self and the readers of The SWLing Post:
What an excellent read! Thank you for sharing this link, Kris!
(Source: The Guardian via BJ Leiderman and Kris Partridge)
America’s rural radio stations are vanishing – and taking the country’s soul with them
When I arrive at the radio station, Mark Lucke is standing in the doorway, looking out at the spitting, winter rain. He’s slim and stoic, with sad, almost haunted, eyes. The first thing he asks is if I’d like to see “the dungeon”. Who wouldn’t?
Lucke pulls on a Steeler’s jacket and a baseball cap over brown hair that falls halfway down his back, and leads me across the five-acre yard. Out here, 90 miles east of Tucson, the desert is a long sweep of brush the color of beach sand. Lucke seems to slip through the rainy day like a ghost.
The radio station, whose call letters are KHIL, has long been the daily soundtrack for this frontier town (population 3,500) that prides itself on its cowboy culture and quiet pace of life. But six decades after the founding of the station, the property is in foreclosure, with utility disconnect notices coming nearly every month.
Small-town radio is fizzling nationwide, as stations struggle to attract advertisement dollars. And as station owners are forced to sell, media conglomerates snap up rural frequencies for rock-bottom prices, for the sole purpose of relocating them to urban areas. In a more affluent market, they can be flipped for a higher price. With limited frequencies available, larger broadcasters purchase as many as possible – especially those higher on the dial – in a race not dissimilar to a real estate grab.[…]
Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Kris Partridge, who shares the following film from the archives of the Radio Society of Great Britain (RSGB):
Click here to view on YouTube.
Wow! Thanks so much for sharing this film, Kris. What an amazing number of classic rigs. Hams back then needed some serious muscle to take their gear to the field!
(Source: Southgate ARC via Kris Partridge)
‘Who can I trust to give me the real news?’
Where and how should American citizens access trustworthy news, how do journalists determine real from fake news, and how can the average citizen identify fake news and avoid accidentally promoting it through social media?
These questions and more are of great importance to citizens across greater Cincinnati and the nation.
They’ll be addressed by the Cincinnati Society of Professional Journalists and other area media on Thursday, April 26 at a panel discussion in conjunction with the National Voice of America Museum of Broadcasting in West Chester on the topic of “Who can I trust to give me the real news?”
The event is being underwritten by Kehoe Financial Advisors.Panelist moderator will be Tom McKee of WCPO, with panelists Hagit Limor of the University of Cincinnati journalism program; Jim Bebbington of Cox Media Group; Ann Thompson of WVXU; and Kevin Aldridge of the Enquirer.
Admission will be the same as last year– $10 for adults and $5 for students. Since this was a standing-room only event last year, we’re encouraging people to order tickets in advance of the event.
Melinda Zemper
Board Member
National VOA Museum of Broadcasting
(513) 706-3737
(Source: BBC News via Kris Partridge)
Belgium’s telegram service is about to stop. Stop.
One hundred and seventy-one years after the first electrical message was transmitted down a line running alongside the railway between Brussels and Antwerp the final dispatch will be sent and received on 29 December.
The fact that this 19th-Century technology is still up and running in the age of Instagram and Snapchat may seem rather odd – especially when you consider that the UK, which invented the telegram in the 1830s, abandoned it as long ago as 1982.
The United States followed suit in 2006 and even India, which had been by far the world’s biggest market for the telegram, finally closed its system down in 2013.
Just 10 businesses and a handful of individual customers have kept the Belgian system going until now. It has been chiefly used by bailiffs, who had need of a system which provided legal guarantees of dispatch and receipt.
The buyer can call up a telephone operator to spell out their message, which is then sent by post.
But with a “flash” telegram costing €23.75 (£21) for a basic 20 words, plus €0.90 for delivery in and around Brussels, it is not difficult to see why the system is struggling to survive in the age of unlimited texting on cheap mobile phone tariffs.
Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Kris Partridge, who writes:
I think you might like the [link] below, I’m thinking that the British Vintage Wireless Society’s auction would be of much interest to your readership:
https://www.bvws.org.uk/auctions/photos.php/2017-12-03-royal-wootton-bassett
Wow–thanks, Kris! What a fantastic array of vintage radios. I’m so happy I don’t live anywhere near Royal Wootton Bassett–the last thing I need right now is that sort of temptation! I’m afraid I’d walk away with a few vintage goodies if I attended.
Kris also points out one radio in particular: the Televisor-type chassis and Schaub Lorenz Music-Center (48 hour recording Radio):
He included a link to this video of the Schaub Lorenz Music-Center in action. An amazing bit of mechanical engineering:
The National NC-173
Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Kris Partridge (G8AUU), who sent the following feedback a few days ago. Sorry for missing the boat, Kris!
Kris writes:
Just under two weeks ago I was watching a Norwegian film on Polish TV (no, don’t ask) and knowing how the sight of old radio’s in films is of interest to you and your readers I was going to write but travel and work, Passendale100 commemorations in Belgium, got in the way. The radio in question was a National NC-173 receiver. And the film Kon-Tiki.
There is much written about the exploits of the voyage and the operators of LI2B. I give as an example from PA7MDJ http://pa7mdj.blogspot.co.uk/2016/10/the-kon-tiki-expedition-and-heroes-of.html?m=1 I leave it to PA7MDJ’s most excellent blog to tell more, he has some Nation Radio Company images from 1947 illustrating his piece and at the end there is a very extensive links listing.
But another reason for writing is that tomorrow, Monday, 07 August is the 70th anniversary of the end of the voyage as the raft landed on the reef. On the 67th anniversary the ARRL did an article on LI2B, why the 67th?
What happened on the 7th of August 1947, and in the 36 hours after, says much about the build quality of the National NC-173.
How many radios today would survive a dunking in seawater and after drying out still be working?
I’ve just been to my book shelves and after a small search found my copy of The Kon-Tiki Expedition published in 1950 given to me not too many years later.
You find LI2B in the book’s index twice. Once describing the operation of the radio ‘corner’ and a very QRP contact between the raft and Oslo Norway. 6 watts CW on 13990 kc. per second, the book being written in 1949 no kHz.
LI2B had been given permission to operate out of but adjacent to as well as in the 20 metre band. The second entry concerns what happen after the raft ends up on the reef and the radio shack and equipment got flooded.
They had been in contact before hitting the reef and there was a 36 hour window before the air search and rescue operations would begin. The drying out of the equipment took no little time and the writer describes how slowly the receiver came to life but no transmitter.
Finally they were able make contact, just before the 36 hrs ended,using a WW2 hand cranked resistance, the book says sabotage, transmitter.
Both the radio operators on the Kon-Tiki had been radio operators in the Norwegian resistance in WW2, only 2 years earlier.
If one puts LI2B into Google images quite an interesting assortment of radio related images are found (click here to view search), including QSL cards but the one I like best is this http://f6blk.net/photos/LI2Bshack_x1.jpg:
I’m sure I’ve seen an English language version, this one looks slightly cropped since the end of the ‘Earth’ wire is out of vision
Regards es 73 de
Kris G8AUU
How fascinating! Thanks so much for sharing this, Kris.
Again, apologies I didn’t get this posted prior to the 70th anniversary–I’m a tad behind (understatement alert) on email at the moment.
I have a particular affinity for The Kon-Tiki Expedition. I found a 1950s copy of the book while doing my undergraduate degree ages ago.
My 1950s copy of The Kon-Tiki Expedition in an archival cover.
The book played no small part in my fascination with anthropology–especially Heyerdahl’s version of “applied” anthropology. I went on to do my post grad work in anthropology at the London School of Economics. Indeed, I re-read that book before my finals to remind myself the significance of anthropology.
If you haven’t read The Kon-Tiki Expedition, I highly recommend you do so! Indeed, it’s about time I read it again.
I’m very curious how many SWLing Post readers have a National NC-173 sitting in their shack? Thor would tell you to take care of it, because it certainly took care of his crew!
