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| Classic QSL from Rádio Nacional do Brasil |
Thank you to hosts Ray Robinson and Jeff White for a look at Brazil's Rádio Nacional do Brasil
Jeff: 1936 was a very busy year for radio broadcasting developments, because a number of stations have this year been celebrating their 90th anniversaries, including Radio Prague, Akashvani /All India Radio, and Radio Nacional de Angola. We brought you the Angola story two weeks ago, when we mentioned that Angola is the second largest Portuguese-speaking country on earth, second only to Brazil. Well, now this week, we can’t leave out the fact that Rádio Nacional do Brasil is also celebrating its 90th anniversary on September 12th, in fact. With that story from Los Angeles, here’s Ray Robinson.
Ray: Thanks, Jeff. We brought you the story of early wireless developments in Brazil back in 2021, so we won’t repeat that now, except to say that the very first radio broadcast station in Brazil was a temporary medium-wave station erected in Rio de Janeiro for the 1922-23 World Exposition. The frequency used was 620 kHz with 750 watts from an antenna on top of Mount Corcovado, where the statue of Christ the Redeemer now stands. When the Expo closed, the station was packed up and sold to a new station in New York City – WNYC, who re-opened it a year later in July 1924 with 1 kW on 570 kHz.
At the time of the Expo in Rio, it was actually illegal in Brazil for private individuals to own radio receiving sets, but that law was relaxed soon afterwards, and many radio clubs or societies sprang up. Commercial stations started to appear in the early 1930’s, and the use of both medium wave and tropical band shortwave began to proliferate. It was against this background that Rádio Nacional was founded as a private entity on September 12, 1936, in Rio de Janeiro, then the capital of Brazil. Today, the station stands as one of the most significant and culturally influential public broadcasting institutions in South America.
Recognizing the station’s unparalleled power to shape public discourse and reach the masses, President Getúlio Vargas nationalized Rádio Nacional in 1940 and renamed it Rádio Nacional do Brasil. Under state control, it became the main driver of the government’s efforts to construct a unified national culture.
During the 1940’s and 50s — affectionately known as the "Golden Age" of Brazilian radio — Rádio Nacional achieved absolute dominance. Utilizing high-power medium-wave and shortwave transmitters in the country’s main coastal cities, the station's signal blanketed up to 40% of the national territory.
It was especially successful and had a historic impact in three main areas:
• Brazilian Popular Music & Samba – where it launched the careers of legendary artists and popularized regional sounds nationwide,
• Radio Soap Operas (Radionovelas) – which captivated tens of millions daily, forming a collective national entertainment pastime, and
• Football (Soccer) Broadcasts – which single-handedly built fanbases in the northeast for all the main clubs in Rio and Sao Paolo.
As the country prepared to shift its political center inland to the new city of Brasilia, Rádio Nacional Brasília was inaugurated in 1958, two years prior to the official opening of the new capital.
However, the station's trajectory was drastically altered following the 1964 military coup. During the dictatorship, which lasted for 21 years from 1964-1985, the network was subject to tight state censorship. In the early 1970’s in particular, the government became concerned at the amount of cold war propaganda that was being transmitted to Brazil in Portuguese by foreign countries, especially socialist or communist ones such as Cuba. Foreign broadcasts in Portuguese were easily heard by Brazilians who were very used to using shortwave – it was part of their culture – and the government feared that such foreign broadcasts might start winning over hearts and minds. And so, the government took decisive action to equip Rádio Nacional to become an important tool under the "National Security Doctrine", to counter such international communist shortwave broadcasts targeted to the interior.
First they set aside a major new 1,200-acre transmitter site for Rádio Nacional at the Parque do Rodeador, or Rodeo Park, about 18 miles northeast of Brasilia. New high-power transmitters were installed, and the site was inaugurated by then-president Emilio Médici on March 11, 1974.
Audio Clip - 1973 08 09 - R Nacional of Brasilia (15445kHz) - English ID > available at Wavescan podcast link at: https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/wavescan
Then on September 1, 1977, a new service called Rádio Nacional da Amazônia was launched. Initially, this utilized several 150 kW shortwave transmitters to broadcast a service that had been specifically engineered to reach the deep, inaccessible interior of the Amazon basin.
By 1979 the site housed 6 x 250kW Brown Boveri shortwave transmitters from Switzerland, and also 2 x 300kW medium wave transmitters which could provide a combined output power of 600kW, sufficient to cover the entire country at night on 980 kHz. The shortwave transmitters were used for both domestic and international coverage, the primary frequencies being 6180 and 11780 kHz. They also had a high-power FM transmitter on 96.1 MHz for the city of Brasilia.
Audio Clip – R Nacional of Brasilia - English ID (male) available at Wavescan podcast link at: https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/wavescan
For the international broadcasts, they used five languages - English, German, French, Spanish & Portuguese. In subsequent decades, though, budget cutbacks and failing equipment meant the end of the international service. Transmitter tubes failed, and replacements were no longer available. So, they had to reduce the number of transmitters in service, and the Amazon once again became the priority for coverage instead of international audiences. The shortwave transmitters that remained in service were then reserved exclusively for the Rádio Nacional da Amazônia service, broadcasting only in Portuguese.
And today, for millions of riverside residents, indigenous tribes, and rural workers lacking telephone lines or internet, the shortwave broadcasts on 11,780 kHz and 6,180 kHz ~ now with 100 kW on the same two frequencies they used back in the 70’s ~ remain the only medium for news, education, and personal safety. To this day, the station functions as a community bulletin board where families separated by dense rainforest can still send personal messages to locate lost relatives.
In 2018, Parque do Rodeador was classified as a critical national infrastructure resource because in the event of a major catastrophe (such as floods, blackouts, or natural disasters), it's the only place from which the government can broadcast to the entire country, without dependence on satellites or Internet infrastructure.
Rádio Nacional has been developed into a multi-tiered network tailored to modern infrastructure and regional demands. It still operates regional AM/FM hubs like Rádio Nacional Brasília and Rádio Nacional Rio de Janeiro, which provide a blend of journalism, public service announcements, and traditional Brazilian music. Then on May 7, 2021, Rádio Nacional took a major technological leap by migrating onto Brazil’s newly established "extended FM band" at 87.1 MHz, with high-power FM transmitters in previously unserved major metropolitan areas such as São Paulo, Belo Horizonte, and Recife. Rádio Nacional also operates important regional stations such as Rádio Nacional do Alto Solimões, which transmits on AM and FM from Tabatinga right at the point where the borders of Brazil, Peru, and Colombia meet. In this way, it helps secure borderland sovereignty by broadcasting local news and indigenous culture along the critical tri-border region.
Of course, Rádio Nacional has pushed aggressively into digital spaces, and the entire network is now available via a dedicated mobile app, allowing global access to its historical and real-time content. Celebrating its historic milestones, Rádio Nacional continues to balance its dual identity: a cutting-edge digital public broadcaster for urban centers, and a reliable shortwave companion for the most remote corners of the Amazon. We congratulate them on 90 years of public broadcasting.
Back to you, Jeff.
(Ray Robinson-Wavescan 915/06 Sept 2026)
