Posted on 07/04/2016 9:24:15 AM PDT by Zionist Conspirator
Way back in the early 70s, my mother's youngest brother (who was a seasonal worker for the US Army Corps of Engineers), as was his habit, brought his car over to our house while he was away on "the boat" (as we all called it). But this time he left something else . . . an very plain-looking, ordinary radio.
Back in those days FM was still fairly exotic. AM was still king, and that's where most of the music and regular radio programming was. This little radio happened to have both AM and FM. But it had a third option--something labeled "SW."
I had no idea what this "SW" was at the time, so naturally I began listening. At first all I got was noise. Then I noticed some of the noise was decidedly atypical for radio static. There were Morse code signals, muffled voices (I found out later they were hams), things that sounded like a constant roar (we assumed these were the "motors" of ships and planes) as well as what most people know as "woodpeckers."
This was all very interesting, but it certainly didn't seem to have any entertainment value. Then before long, I noticed that at night, I started picking up stations (though nowhere near as clear as the other two bands). And what stations!
The first was station HCJB, the Voice of the Andes in Quito, Ecuador (a Protestant missionary station). Then came the Voice of America . . . Radio Canada International . . . BBC World Service . . . and then I discovered the really exotic stuff--Radio Moscow . . . Radio Havana Cuba . . . Swiss Radio International . . . Deutsche Welle . . . Radio Nederland Wereldemroep . . . Swiss Radio International . . .
Yes . . . I had, quite by accident, stumbled upon the wonderful world of international broadcasting!
In those days most adults had lived through World War II and I had of course heard of Tokyo Rose. Here was the same thing! Not only did I get to listen to the government radio of exotic foreign countries, but I had a whole half a world of "bad guys" to listen to, just like the grown ups had thirty years before!
Naturally I gave names to the various Commie announcers. The two most common English language announcers on Radio Moscow I named Moscow Mildred and Leningrad Larry. Radio Havana Cuba had three: Havana Hannah, Santiago Sam, and Cuba Clyde. It was all so magical.
And there was something else as well . . . that wonderful time signal broadcast continuously from the National Bureau of Standards in Fort Collins, Colorado--an obsessive-compulsive's dream!
Then after I graduated from high school I decided I wanted a better radio. I found one in a mail order catalogue . . . a ten band beauty with two short wave bands. Homina-homina-homina!!! I enjoyed that radio so much over the decades. I kept it by my bed so I could listen to it at any time, though of course it was portable. The only problem was that two short wave bands, like the one I had access to previously, wasn't enough. It didn't have the whole spectrum. There were stations out there I couldn't get or couldn't find. Plus my beloved time signal immigrated across the band and at times disappeared completely.
I dreamed of a humongous digital receiving set that could get everything, even the broadcasts of Irish anarchists on a ship at sea whose broadcaster had to be turned off intermittently to keep it from melting down. Well, I was poor and couldn't afford the coveted Grundigs or any such thing. It was just me and my ten band for thirty years (and the old analogue dial slipped a lot and at times couldn't even access everything it should have).
Before going further, I would like to reminisce just a little bit about those stations and those broadcasts.
Voice of America was important to me because I could actually listen to exotic foreign languages I had only read of before, languages my parents had never heard spoken in their lives. There would be the "ding" at the top (or bottom) of the hour followed by a voice saying "This is the Voice of America; the following program is in [fill in the blank]." Wow.
And straight out of World War II was AFRTS, the American Forces Radio and Television Service.
Deutsche Welle was important because it represented a country that not too long ago had been an enemy, but was now an ally. I really enjoyed their 65 minute programs, especially the feature with Larry Wayne, Deutsche Welle's answer to Paul Harvey. And at the end of each of his programs he would always close by saying "with regards from Jezzy, the Cat What Am!" Unfortunately they eventually cut back to just twenty minutes and Larry Wayne and Jezzy were gone.
Sunday nights meant "Happy Station" on Radio Nederland hosted by the redoubtable Tom Meijer. "Happy Station" had begun way back in 1928 with Eddie Startz and was one of the oldest and longest-lasting programs in broadcasting history.
Albania was one of the most isolated and repressive countries on the world under the heel of the unlamented Enver Hoxha (the only country to actually make the worship of G-d a crime), but their signal came in loud and clear. I recall one time the announcer chirping that in Albania "the socialist spring is blooming with all the colors of the rainbow."
HCJB and Family Radio WYFR often carried the old gospel dramatic program "Unshackled." Does anyone else remember that? HCJB also had a program called "The Cracker Barrel" where they read viewer mail.
And of course for many years I was a regular listener (especially on Shabbat and holidays) of Qol Yisra'el, the Voice of Israel.
My QSL card collection (which I still have) is small, but I was very proud of it. I got cards from Qol Yisra'el, HCJB, Radio Nederland's "Family Radio," the Voice of Turkey, Radio Japan, Radio Australia (famous for having gone completely broke at one time), the Voice of Spain, Deutsche Welle, and various other stations (I'm sure I've forgotten several). I had two rules though: I never sent for a card to a Communist or an Arab station.
Other Communist stations I picked up other than those I have mentioned included Radio Peking (yes, that was actually its name at the time), Radio Prague, Radio Sofia, Radio Budapest, Radio Kiev, and Radio Vilnius. I never did find Radio Berlin International (the East German station). One time I actually picked up Qaddafi's Radio Jamahiriya ("the voice of the Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya") for a few days.
Other exotic stations I picked up were the Voice of Spain, Swiss Radio International, RAI (Italy), Radio Japan, Portugal, the Voice of Turkey, Radio Cairo, Radio RSA (South Africa from Johannesburg), the Voice of Free China (via WYFR in Okeechobee, Florida), and the Pinochet-era Voice of Chile (great music!).
In the early years of this millennium I finally achieved my dream of getting a digital short wave receiver that actually had the entire short wave spectrum on it. Unfortunately, the Internet was already cutting into international shortwave broadcasting as the medium by which governments propagandized each other.
What brought this whole post on was the fact that half a year ago I noticed that my valiant little digital radio was giving forth distorted sounds. It had been around a long time, so I guess it certainly had the right. I tried to find someone who could fix it, but the regular repairman had gone out of business and the people at the local ham club (no, I'm not a member) said that the little radio's time had come and gone. I knew I had to have another one, so I just last month ordered and received its replacement. It's the exact same model it is replacing, which is the cheapest model to cover the entire shortwave spectrum. Unfortunately, international broadcasting on shortwave is now only a shadow of its former self. Even that old stand-by HCJB closed down years ago to be replaced by a series of local AM stations.
Radio Canada International and Swiss Radio International are Internet-only. BBC and Deutsche Welle no longer broadcast to North America. Radio Moscow went out of existence twenty-three years ago. The Cold War is over everywhere except domestically. It's almost all over. I can't even find VOA on the radio any more, much less AFRTS.
A few stations remain. Radio Havana Cuba and China Radio International keep perking on. I can now pick up Radio Hanoi. I even got the Czech Republic the other night. Radio Australia, the station that became famous for going broke, is still around. I got the Voice of Turkey as well as Greece, though Greece is always in Greek.
Nowadays shortwave is primarily the home of religious stations and Alex Jones conspiracy types. The first shortwave station I picked up on my new radio was someone in a thick African (I think) accent claiming that the Jesuits run the CIA. But even so, without a shortwave receiving set available to me, my life is simply not complete. Especially since I can now pick up my beloved time signal and practically any time of the night or day, no matter where it migrates to!
Well . . . these are simply my nostalgic musings about the golden age of Cold War shortwave radio brought about by my having to get a new set. I hope maybe a few of you who had the same experience will consider sharing your experiences as well. -_-
Heh, heh!
;^)
bkmk
Radio Australia is still going strong. And yes, Radio Tirane was a hoot! And they came in so clear!
Yes, you can still get the far-off cities at night. But AM quality is really lousy, much more so than back in the day (I suppose because there are so many more stations). Even local stations during the day are hard to pick up.
I can't help but wonder how people managed to listen to their programs back during the Golden Age of Radio considering it was all AM and at dawn and dusk the local and distant stations interfered with each other. No wonder all the music moved to FM.
Wow . . . how I would have loved having one of those!
Remember Carlos Puebla y sus Tradicionales? They sang "folk songs" about Fidel and Che . . . the lousy Commies!
At one point in those days I began picking up a broadcast from Mexico City (SW). It was all mariachi music rather than news. But they said for mailing them and sending in a list of things (including some sort of international coupon I had to get at the post office) they would send a bunch of stuff including "a map of the Mexican republic." I sent all the stuff and got nothing.
I've never gotten Pyongyang. I think they're still on, but well off the regular broadcast frequencies and moving around a lot.
The "woodpecker" was a Soviet over-the-horizon backscatter radar:
A picture, from a distance:
and up close (rotated 90 degrees, for some reason):
In popular culture, the "wall" around Chicago in the Divergent/Insurgent series of movies was modeled after it.
They laid out the details of radio and television broadcasting in every country in the world, frequencies, schedules etc. etc.
I really wanted to hear all the local stations but could only get the shortwave relays of local radio stations.
When the Internet came around one of the first things I did was to listen to the online streams from local stations in all parts of the world.
It's almost impossible to get a "radio" these days. It's always built into something else. And now Radio Shack barely exists.
I think Fry’s still sells them.
Yep I remember the erector sets. We had those when I was growing up.
I remember building houses and buildings with American Plastic Bricks. We had numerous sets of those American Plastic Bricks. They were similar to Legos, but much larger, and much sturdier. You could build a house with the bricks from their plans provided in the set, or you could invent your own building design. I mostly did the latter, LOL.
I have a Sangean ATS 505, which is the smallest and cheapest set to have the entire shortwave spectrum. It just arrived a little over a week ago and replaces one exactly like it that lasted for years (including many falls to the floor) before the speaker started going bad. It's a lot of money for nothing now, but O how I would have loved to have had one like it back in the day. Besides, I simply can't live without a shortwave radio.
I bought both of the Sangeans here (it's the first one on the page).
Great memories in your column!
I discovered my grandparents' "Silvertone" floor model and "Philco" table radio models from the 1930's, each of which had back lit dials and the "Magic Eye" (or "Cat's Eye" as others called it) green tuning tube that let you "visualize" how good your tuning signal was.
On December 16, 1972 I recall I was listening to the news reports on the Silvertone pertaining to Nixon's bombing of Hanoi on AFRTS - and I say specifically on December 16, because Deutsche Well was at the same time celebrating Beethoven's birthday!
An interesting thing about HCJB, Radio Moscow, and the broadcast of ever ticking National Bureau of Standards Time atomic clock -- in 1970 I lived in Cape May, NJ and Sunoco sold a promotional item at their gas stations for $4.99 - a "Pump radio" which was an AM embodied within the shape of a Sunoco gasoline pump. The receiving transistor radio mechanism was made in Taiwan, and at a time later at night than ~ 10 PM, you could pick up HCJB, Radio Moscow, and the Atomic Clock at places way up at the top of the dial, just around 1580 or 1590 MHz, and then just past 1600 up around 1620 - 1630 mHz. I don't know if being at the shoreline and on such a peninsula made any difference in the reception that allowed for this.
You'll doubtlessly remember that after the minute time was announced "At the sound of the tone the time will be xx:xx...." their was a distinctive hum on each striking second which lasted and gradually faded until it ended ~ 20 seconds before the next time announcement.
I eventually got a Grundig when the tubes started to burnout out of the Philco and the Silvertone and I'd used up whatever spares I had from the old TV repair man who used to come the house with his "Dr's bag" of tubes and testers. He closed his business and there was obviously no eBay back then to find what were becoming more rare "5Y4G"'s!
Thanks for allowing me to travel the world in my mind all over again!
FReegards!
Try one of the SDR (software defined radio) USB dongles, like this:
RTL-SDR Blog R820T2 RTL2832U 1PPM TCXO SMA Software Defined Radio with 2x Telescopic Antennas
That will tune from 24 MHz to 1.7 Ghz. Plug that into a USB port, and use one of these software packages to "tune" it:
The BIG List of RTL-SDR Supported Software
If you want wider range, try this:
That will expand the range down to 1 kHz.
Lots of stuff available from an old-time company, Universal Radio:
http://www.universal-radio.com/catalog/portable.html
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