happystation

Updated description; December 2019. This early edition of Media Network starts with the news that a postal strike in the Netherlands is delaying listener mail. We carried an interview with Owen Garriott, the first amateur radio operator in space.  While attending the World Telecom Expo in 1983, Jonathan Marks walked down the hill to the Palais de Nations, the UN HQ in Geneva. The goal was to solve the mystery of SSB transmissions in Russian on 14500 kHz USB emanating from the gardens of the building. We spoke with Anthony Kernow of the UN to find out what goes on "radiowise" in the building. This edition also includes an interview with a former producer and translator in the English section of Radio Netherlands, the American Robert Haslach. In 1983 he published his account of Dutch World Broadcasting (still available via Amazon) which traces the early years of PCJJ and PCLL with transmitters in Eindhoven and Huizen. His book is quite critical of one of the early announcers/hosts on the radio station, Eddy Startz of Happy Station fame. He points out that Startz was born in Aachen right on the Dutch border and was never clear about what he did in World War 2. However, the work he did through Happy Station in positioning the Netherlands as a friendly nation is not disputed. It certainly covers the period when the English department was mainly operating to explain how the Dutch were reconstructing after the war, playing lots of music and tourist features interspersed with a short news bulletin and commentary. The book stops in the mid-seventies when transmission times were reduced and emphasis changed to more news and feature programmes. This edition concludes with African Media news from Richard Ginbey. He reports that South Africa is making more use of mediumwave, with Radio 5 appearing on 683 kHz. The test transmissions on 7295 kHz from Botswana were officially commissioned on November 3rd. Voice of Mozambique National resistance has moved their transmitter to a new frequency 4772 kHz. Radio Bardai has returned to 6009 kHz. There have been changes to the Spanish language broadcasts from Luanda aimed at Cuban troops in Angola.