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| NCN Studios, Georgetown-2009 |
Jeff: Today, Ray Robinson takes a look at broadcasting in the South American country of Guyana, which got jump-started by an interesting American expedition into the country’s interior. Here’s Ray with the story.
Ray: Thanks, Jeff. The country of Guyana is located on the north coast of South America, squeezed between Venezuela to the west, and Surinam to the east. It is just a small tropical country, 300 miles wide and 400 miles long, with a total population of just over one million. About 40% trace their origins back to India, 30% to Africa, and most of the rest are either indigenous or of mixed race. Less than half of 1% are European. The capital city is Georgetown, with a unique floating bridge, more than one mile long, over the River Demerara.
If the noted naturalist Charles Darwin had visited this area in South America, he would have discovered a multitude of unique varieties here, more than he did in his famous expedition to the Galapagos Islands during the 1830’s. It is stated that Guyana has 4,000 plants that are not found anywhere else in the world, as well as many unique animal species, including the Golden Frog.
n ancient times, this region was inhabited by native Americans of three different tribes; the Arawak, Carib and Warrau. Christopher Columbus was the first European visitor to the area, sailing along the coastline in 1498. Almost a century later, the Dutch established the first European settlement, but they ceded the area to England in 1814. The British colony of British Guiana was formally established in 1
1831.
In 1966, British Guiana gained its independence as Guyana, and four years later, this new country became a republic. And because of its British colonial background, it’s the only country in continental South America with English as its official language.
Back in 1937, a group of six American explorers left the United States for a season of exploration in the northern jungle areas of South America on behalf of the American Museum of Natural History in New York. This expedition, known as the Terry-Holden Expedition, arrived in Georgetown, British Guiana, and then set off up the local river systems on September 29, 1937, in flat-bottom boats for a 500-mile journey inland.
Three weeks later, the expedition established a base camp in the foothills of the Sierra Akarai Mountains near the border with Brazil. Here, they installed a 200 watt RCA shortwave transmitter in a grass hut; this unit was allotted the callsign VP3THE, with the letters THE in the callsign identifying the Terry-Holden Expedition.
An advance party then travelled a further 200 miles on horseback, taking with them a small 50 watt Collins mobile transmitter for regular contact with the base camp.
On October 13, the expedition station VP3THE was heard for the first time in the United States, on 13900 kHz. On this occasion, VP3THE was also in contact with amateur station VP3BG back in the capital city, Georgetown. And it was that station, VP3BG, along with a neighboring station VP3MR, that were to grow into the first full-blown commercial broadcasting station in Guyana.
One month after the expedition station VP3THE’s first test transmission, the party began broadcasting weekly radio reports back to the United States for nationwide coverage in the NBC Red and Blue networks. Sometimes the programs were relayed via VP3BG and VP3MR in Georgetown, and sometimes, when propagation conditions allowed, the transmission was made direct to the RCA station at Rocky Point on Long Island.
Three months after the initial test broadcast, the expedition station VP3THE left the air, never to return again. The final broadcast was made early in the new year, on January 15, 1938. The operator, Orison
Hungerford, arrived back in New York three months later, during the month of April.
Two very different QSL cards were issued to verify reception reports of the Terry-Holden Expedition. One was a duplicated plain text card with a hand drawn microphone issued by NBC in New York. These cards were non-specific regarding the information in the QSL text. The other card was of a large folder design, containing three photos of the station out in the jungle, and brief information about the expedition, as well as full QSL details.
So what became of VP3BG and VP3MR in Georgetown? Well, they had come about initially some two years before the 1937 expedition, due to the demand for cricket commentary. They broadcast on tropical band shortwave, and in 1938 were amalgamated into a single station, ZFY. The station’s studios were in the Post Office building until it was burnt down in the Great Fire of Georgetown in February 1945. Later that year, they moved into a new building and also secured their first medium-wave transmitter.
In 1950, the station was renamed Radio Demerara, Demerara being the name of the river that flows past Georgetown. The station was required by its license to broadcast BBC material for 3 hours per day, and a further 90 minutes per day of other programming provided by the UK’s Central Office of Information (in London).
Here’s a sign-on of Radio Demerara in 1974 on 395 metres, 760 kHz, and I had to smile when I heard this one, because the announcer identifies himself as being “Ray Robinson”!: Audio clip available at:
(No relation to me!) In
1958, a
second radio station was launched by Demerara's parent company, British Guiana
Broadcasting Service (BGBS), with a focus on broadcasting special events and
sports coverage. Radio Demerara was on
760 kHz, and BGBS was on 560 kHz.
Two years after independence, in 1968, the government of Guyana
took over the BGBS station and renamed it the Guyana Broadcasting Service
(GBS). They then built some additional studio
facilities with technical aid from engineers at the BBC's Bush House in London.
In 1979, the government acquired Radio Demerara as well, and the
two stations were then operated under the auspices of a new entity, the Guyana
Broadcasting Corporation. In 1980, Radio
Demerara was rebranded as Channel 1, Radio Roraima, still on 760 kHz, and GBS
was rebranded as Channel 2, the Voice of Guyana, on 560 kHz. The first FM service, on 98.1 MHz, went on
the air in 1998.
In 2004, to cut costs, the radio service (Guyana Broadcasting
Corporation) and the TV service (GTV), which were both operating at a loss,
were combined into a single organization – the National Communications Network
(NCN).
Here's a sign-on of the NCN’s Voice of Guyana from April 2017:https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/wavescan
And that 560 kHz transmitter is still on the air today, 24 hours a day, with 7 kW from Georgetown. For many years in Guyana, the broadcasting climate was one of nationalization and tight government control, but since the early 20-teens, a number of privately-owned low-power FM stations have been licensed, although often to organizations with close links to the government. Curiously, Guyana is one of the few British Commonwealth countries NOT to have a local BBC World Service relay on FM.
Back to you, Jeff.
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