The end of the Cuban missile crisis was first heard in a country house in Berkshire
The denouement was undramatic. The Cuban missile crisis in 1962 might have begun with public declarations from President John Kennedy and the threat of nuclear annihilation for all, but its conclusion was much more muted. The West first realised that the end was not nigh after all when, in a charming country house in Berkshire in south-east England, a translator working for the bbc put on a pair of headphones, tuned in to Radio Moscow and listened as Nikita Khrushchev’s climbdown began.
The wars of the 20th century offered two main ways for enemy nations to understand what the other was up to. One was to use secret agents and tradecraft and derring-do. The other was to switch on the radio and let that nation simply tell you, sometimes twice daily, often with nice music in between. The radio led to few thrills and fewer thrillers (not many novels star a protagonist sitting in headphones for eight hours a day) but it still mattered. Joseph Goebbels was convinced that his department had been infiltrated by a spy; in truth, British translators had just been listening to Nazi broadcasts each morning.
Additional story at: https://archive.ph/Bk7Ei#selection-651.0-675.483
