Part 1
Jeff: The edition of Wavescan that airs on the
first Sunday of each month usually includes a DX Report from the Japan
Shortwave Club, presented by Yukiko Tsuji.
But it occurred to us that we haven’t visited the story of domestic
broadcasting in Japan for quite some time, and have only occasionally covered
Japanese shortwave broadcasting during the Second World War. So, this week Ray Robinson tells the story of
early wireless and medium wave stations in Japan.
Ray: Thanks, Jeff.
Early Wireless Stations in Japan
It was in 1889, six years before Marconi, that the first wireless experiments took place in Japan. The first public demonstration of wireless was given by Hantaro Nagaoka at the University of Tokyo.
Two experimental stations were subsequently established
by the Japanese Navy, and these were listed in 1902 as being in Tokyo and
Yokohama, just a few miles apart. Subsequent
listings show another experimental station in Nagasaki in 1906. That station was apparently a forerunner to a
larger and more permanent station at the same location.
By 1908, two stations were active with
maritime communications, located at Nagasaki and Choshi. The Choshi station used the callsign JCS. Ambitiously, up to a dozen more wireless
stations were in the planning stages, but it seems not all of those came to
fruition.
By 1913, eight wireless stations were in use,
all identified in Morse Code with "J" callsigns, such as JOS at
Osezaki and JTS at Tsunoshima, as well as the previously mentioned JCS at
Choshi. Many of these operated on
longwave.
During 1914, radio interests in the United
States established two very large wireless stations for communication across
the Pacific. These twin stations were
located near San Francisco, California and Kahuku, Hawaii. It was the intent that they would
subsequently be able to exchange messages with a large new station still under
construction near Yokohama, Japan.
Just one year later, on July 27, 1915, the
new high-powered wireless station, actually located near Yokohama at Funabashi on Tokyo
Bay, was officially opened with service to the United States via Kahuku,
Hawaii. Two months later again, the
transmission of wireless messages from Japan was extended to many additional
countries via communication links with wireless stations located in eastern
Siberia.
Formal government use of the new wireless
communication system linking the United States and Asia was recognized when
official messages were exchanged between the Mikado in Japan and President
Woodrow Wilson in the United States on November 5, 1916.
However, the new Trans-Pacific Wireless
Service was then interrupted for a couple of years due to World War I, and it
was re-opened again on December 19, 1918, with the Tokyo station adopting the
callsign JSDA.
Now, you might ask, what form of code was
used by the operators of the wireless stations in Japan? By the time wireless stations were
established, Morse Code was already three quarters of a century old. The original telegraph code was developed by
Samuel Morse and Alfred Vail sometime before 1840, and when wireless stations
were established, the spark transmitters talked to each other in Morse Code. That is, if they were conversing in English. As needs arose, various modifications were
made to standard Morse Code to accommodate alphabetic variations, in for
example, German, Spanish and Russian.
But because Japanese is written very
differently as a pictographic language, it became necessary to develop a system
of code that could be understood in that language. And that indeed became very complicated.
But for international communication between
Japan and other countries, Morse Code in English was generally used. And for maritime communication with
international shipping, much of the Morse Code communication was conducted
using standard maritime codes.
However, by the early 1920’s, four major
factors began to bring about significant changes in electronic communication in
Japan. These factors were:
1. the manufacturing
and availability of radio tubes/valves,
2. the
subsequent development of valve transmitters which permitted the transmission
of speech,
3. the
introduction of radio program broadcasting in many countries, including Japan,
and
4. the use of
high frequencies, or shortwave, for international communication.
Because of these factors, many of the longwave
spark wireless stations in Japan were either converted to valve operation, or
were eliminated as no longer necessary.
And thus ended the nearly twenty year period of
wireless telegraphic communication in Japan, domestically using a very
different form of Morse Code.
Early
Medium Wave Stations in Japan
It was in 1922 that experimental telephony in Japan began, with the availability of newly developed radio valves (or tubes). Initially, these experiments were carried out on high frequencies, that is shortwave, though coverage was achieved only over short distances.
Interestingly, the first Japanese radio broadcasting station was erected, not in Japan, but in China. This station was constructed in Japan using Japanese-made equipment, and it was installed at Shuang Chaio, some eight miles from Peking, or Beijing, as it is known today. This medium wave broadcasting station was inaugurated on June 29, 1924.
The first transmission of radio broadcast programs in Japan itself began on March 1, 1925, with a test broadcast from a temporary station located on Atago Hill in Tokyo. A photograph from that era shows that the Minister for Communications in the national government heard this broadcast. This first temporary radio broadcasting station was officially inaugurated three weeks later on March 22 with a program that included classical European and Japanese music.
Four months later, on July 12, 1925, a
permanent radio broadcasting station for Tokyo was inaugurated at Atagoyama. The main 1 kW transmitter was made in the
United States, though the reserve transmitter was locally assembled, by the
staff at the radio station itself. At
the time, there were just three thousand five hundred radio receivers in
operation in the Tokyo area.
Similar stations were constructed in Osaka and Nagoya, and these were both officially opened during the same year 1925.
The callsigns and details for these three radio stations were:
|
JOAK |
Tokyo |
1 kW |
800 kHz |
|
JOBK |
Osaka |
.5 kW |
780 kHz |
|
JOCK |
Nagoya |
1.5 kW |
833 kHz |
The system of letters used for the callsigns in early radio stations in Japan is quite intriguing. Taking the first station, JOAK, as an example, the letter J obviously stood for Japan. The second letter, O, may have stood for Oceania, which was part of the callsign identification for radio stations in several countries in the Pacific in those days. And the final letter K, probably stood for Kyokai, a Japanese word that was later incorporated into the official name for the Japanese radio broadcasting service, NHK, Nippon Hoso Kyokai.
Interestingly, the third letter in the callsign system indicated the chronological order in which the station was established. Thus JOAK was the first station, JOBK was the second, and JOCK was the third, etc., right on down through the English alphabet.
By the mid-1930’s, they had used up the twenty six letters in the English alphabet and new callsigns were issued, this time ending in the letter G instead of K; and subsequently, many other letters also.
In fact, by the mid-1930’s, more than thirty medium wave stations were on the air throughout Japan and these stations were regularly heard in the United States, New Zealand and Australia. Several of the main stations in the large cities were by that time operating a second program channel under the same callsign with a number appended, for example:
|
Tokyo |
JOAK1 on 870 kHz and JOAK2 on 590 kHz |
|
Osaka |
JOBK1 on 690 kHz and JOBK2 on 940 kHz |
|
Nagoya |
JOCK1 on 730 kHz and JOCK2 on 990 kHz |
In August 1936, many of the broadcasting stations in Japan relayed the Berlin Olympics live from Germany.
Radio stations in Japan have always been prolific verifiers of reception reports from listeners. Although there are several undated QSL cards from Japan in the Heritage QSL Collection now being scanned in Australia, it is probable that the earliest is dated on May 31, 1931 from the key station in the NHK network, JOAK in Tokyo.
This QSL card shows that station JOAK was on the air by that time with a power of 10 kW. It has a small black and white photo of their studio and transmitter building. In red is a small ornamental picture, the size and shape of a postage stamp, and it is very reminiscent of the American EKKO QSL stamps from the same era.
Many of the QSL cards from Japan also show an artistic picture, or an actual photo, of the famous Mt. Fuji. Many cards also show photos of the radio broadcasting station, the building, the antenna towers, and the studio facilities.
Interestingly, one of these early Japanese QSL cards shows a short text in the international Esperanto language. This card was printed for use as a verification for station JOAK in Tokyo, but it was modified for use by a small relay station, JOJK in Kanazawa, with 3 kW on 423 metres, 710 kHz. The text in Esperanto reads: Oni korespondas per Esperanto. Translated into understandable English, it reads: We correspond in Esperanto.
Back to you, Jeff.
