During the year 1906, the ether was
fairly buzzing with the Morse Code signals from wireless stations located on
land all around the world, as well as on board ships in all seven of the
world’s great oceans. In fact, the first
edition of a wireless directory was published by the United States Navy on
October 1 of 1906 under the title Wireless Telegraph Stations of the World, and
this directory is considered to be the very first comprehensive listing of
official stations ever published.
By
taking a count from all available sources, it is estimated that there were more
than 500 official wireless stations on land in more than 70 different
countries, with well over 1,000 on board ships.
These listings are for official stations only, and there were an
additional uncounted number of other stations on the air as well, including
many amateur stations for which licensing was not required at that time. Perhaps there was somewhere around 3,000
wireless stations on the air during this era.
During
the year 1906, three notable inventions altered the flow of wireless/radio
development:-
*
General Dunwoodie of the American army invented the crystal detector, know
known widely as the cat’s whisker, which
enabled tuned radio reception
* Lee de Forest patented a
3 element radio tube or valve, the audion as he called it, thus opening
the way for a much wider usage of the vacuum tube in radio development
* Archie Collins patented
voice transmissions via an electric arc
An
important wireless conference took place in Berlin during the year, beginning
October 2, with 100 delegates from 23 countries participating. At this convention, the usage of a new
emergency code was adopted, SOS, replacing the previous CQD. The name radio was also adopted, replacing
the earlier term wireless.
At
this convention, a list of international callsign prefixes was drawn up, and
letters of the alphabet were allocated to each country. For example, wireless station callsigns
beginning with the letter G indicated Great Britain, the letter J indicated
Japan, the letters N & W indicated the United States.
We
should note also that the Telefunken company established a wireless station
near Nauen, in a swampland area some 25 miles north west of Berlin, during this
year.
(This
station at Nauen is still on the air today, with the programming of Adventist
World Radio, including our DX program Wavescan which is heard from this station
every Sunday at 1530 UTC on 11750 kHz at 250 kW. In addition, our sister DX program in the
Italian language is also heard from Nauen each Sunday at 1000 UTC on 9610 kHz
at 100 kW.)
The
most intense usage of wireless anywhere in the world during the year 1906 took
place in the United States, where its is recorded that more than 100 stations
were on the air, operated by the navy and the army, and also by several
different commercial organizations.
In
order to establish a flow of communication after the devastating earthquake in
San Francisco on April 18 and the massive fires that followed, the navy vessel
USS “Chicago” handled an outward flow of messages in Morse Code from San
Francisco to Yerba Buena Island thence to Mare Island and onward to the nationwide system of landline
connections. The fires also destroyed
the wireless station PH in the Palace Hotel and it was re-established at nearby
Russian Hill.
Marconi
engineers warned that their Atlantic coast wireless station was endangered by
cliff erosion; and the transmission
towers operated by Pacific Wireless on Mt Tamalpais near San Francisco were
felled by a jealous competitor.
On January 1, the Canadian born
Reginald Fessenden established wireless communication from his new station at
Brant Rock, 2 kW on 100 kHz, with his equally new station at Micrahanish in
Scotland; but, this Scottish station was destroyed in a storm in December.
On December 21, 1906, Reginald
Fessenden presented a public demonstration of his wireless equipment with an
experimental broadcast before an invited group of local dignitaries. This event is definitely and clearly
chronicled in the verified details of history.
In
question though, are Fessenden’s touted Christmas Eve and New Year’s Eve
broadcasts from this same station a few days later. Much evidence has been piled up, both for and
against, the accuracy of Fessenden’s subsequent claims that he did indeed make
these two intentional radio broadcasts, as historical firsts.
However,
several maritime historians provide an item of information that does not seem
to get quoted by researchers delving into the Fessenden controversy. These maritime historians state that the
wireless operator aboard the new American passenger liner “Kroonland” heard Fessenden’s
Christmas Eve broadcast while out in nearby Atlantic waters. It is true, the ”Kroonland” report could be
revisionist history, but further research might also reveal the veracity of
this claim.
A
postcard dated June 14, 1906, shows the Lee De Forest wireless station at 42
Broadway in New York, and it contains the hand written message: “Aboard steamer
on ocean we just received message about weather reports by wireless.” This card might almost qualify as an early
QSL.
On
November 1, the Christchurch International Exhibition in New Zealand opened at
Hagley Park, with 400 acres of international displays and exhibits from all
around the world. This Christchurch
exhibition was visited by two million people, citizens and international
visitors, before closure on April 15 of the following year 1907. It should be remembered that the total
population of New Zealand itself was only one million at the time.
Two
Marconi representatives, Captain Walker and Engineer Dowsett, established two
wireless stations, one at the Christchurch exhibition in Hagley Park and the
other at a distance several miles away.
Newspapers in both Australia and New Zealand announced in advance that a
wireless exhibit would be staged at the Christchurch International Exhibition.
Two
early experimenters in Australia were Mr. C. P. Bartholomew and Mr. E. F. G.
Jolley, both of whom constructed their own equipment. Bartholomew lived in the Sydney suburb of
Mossman; and Jolley set up two wireless stations in two houses one mile apart in
the country town Marlborough, 100 miles north west of the state capital
Melbourne.
There
was also an experimental set of wireless equipment on board a local steamer at
sea between Mt Nelson and Tasman Island, off the coast of Tasmania.
The
big wireless event in Australia during the year 1906 was the two way
transmission of signals between Victoria and Tasmania, a distance of 150 miles
across Bass Strait. And that story is
scheduled for presentation here in Wavescan a few weeks from now.
(AWR Wavescan/NWS 255)
