The Wireless News

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The Wireless News

For well over a century, radio has provided ships at sea and their well-off passengers with current news of the world (and at times, war news), market data and sports. From Marconi’s wireless telegraph to satellite delivery, the wireless news has been indispensible to voyagers of many sorts, especially on transoceanic routes. Steamship lines saw money to be made in providing this amenity. The technologies of communications and of the printing of newspapers at sea paced each other. Many of these seagoing “newspapers” themselves tell nautical tales and social stories about their readers. But they also illumine their producers in Europe, North America, and Asia, including the shipping lines, the shoreside press, and the radiomen at sea. The radio technology evolved from long waves to satellites, and from spark sets to vacuum tube gear and then to modern solid-state circuits. A demand for current information at sea, far from its sources, created an important maritime revenue stream. The economics of news at sea and the higher socio-economic class of the passengers helped to further the development of the radio art.

Introduction – Young Marconi should be preserved and a special edi- Started It tion of The Transatlantic Times was News for passengers and crew at sea, run off for the benefit of the Seamen’s sent through the ether by “wireless Fund at a dollar a copy. ‘Through the telegraphy,” started with Marconi, as courtesy of Mr. G. Marconi,’ it said, did so much else in radio (see Fig. 1). ‘the passengers on board the St. Paul His daughter Degna Marconi wrote are accorded a rare privilege, that of about her then-young father’s return receiving news several hours before from the United States to England via landing. . . . As we all know, this is the the SS St. Paul in 1899: first time that such a venture as this has been undertaken. A Newspaper “There is a sequel to that epochal published at Sea with Wireless Tele- [1899] transatlantic crossing. When graph messages received and printed the St. Paul was less than 50 miles on a ship going twenty knots. . . .’ from the Needles [near to the Isle of Marconi cheerfully autographed the Wight in Southern England], for an copies. Before the St. Paul docked at hour and a half dispatches reached Southampton, readers knew: the vessel about the progress of the South African War. The ship’s cap- “3·30 [p.m.] 40 miles. Ladysmith, tain, J. C. Jamison, felt that these Kim berley, and Mafeking holding

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out well. No big battle. 15,000 men berley effected the destruction of One recently landed. Tin Pot. It was auctioned for £200. It is “3·40 [p.m.] At Ladysmith no felt that period of anxiety and strain more killed. Bombardment at Kim- is over, and that our turn has come.”1

Fig. 1. This image is an enhanced and cropped version of the cover of the company magazine Wireless World published by the Marconi Press Agency, Ltd. as Volume 1 for February 1914. The Morse code spells out Marconi, and the station is the reconstructed Poldhu, Cornwall ZZ. Worldwide coverage suggested by the cover, which was then aspirational, had to await the short wave “Beam System” developed a decade later. (Author’s collection)

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These messages about the Boer War Great Britain and its Australasian are some of the first recorded wireless colonies could last weeks or months telegraphy traffic. A graphic of the at a time and were notorious for their Transatlantic Times as printed on the dullness . . . . [T]he passengers on SS St. Paul is reproduced as Fig. 2. many journeys got organised and Ship newspapers of the 19th century, elected a committee ‘for promoting until the coming of the wireless news, the entertainment of the passengers primarily allayed boredom on the long during the voyage.’ Besides organ- voyages from one continent to another: ising social activities like sports or musical events, such a committee “While to date there is little infor- often pushed for the compilation of mation as to how common the pro- a ship newspaper, i.e. a newspaper duction of ship newspapers on board produced by passengers for passen- long-distance passenger steamers in gers only with the means available on the late nineteenth century was, we board—and thus concentrated exclu- do know that it was certainly not a sively on topics that were of interest rare thing. The passages between to the travellers.”2

Fig. 2. Marconi’s first newspaper at sea, the Transatlantic Times; his new technology put to a new use immediately. (Courtesy of David Barlow, Lizard Museum)

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Early Evolution of Wireless News at vessels—and even senior captains. Pas- Sea — Sparks at Work senger convenience (and related revenues) entered the picture as well, and Wireless Signals for Distraction thereby hangs the present tale. If Not Distress British maritime wireless opera- Wireless signals were early used for tions enjoyed staffing from the Marconi distress and later for distraction in the Company, which also leased the equip- form of wireless news. At the begin- ment to the vessel owners. The com- ning of the 20th century, the maritime pany trained the operators and largely industry quickly adopted “the wireless” invented the equipment, especially the for signals of distress. (This was at first low frequency, long wave transmitters. CQD then by 1910 SOS. CQD is said Generally, vessels used the shorter 600- to have meant Come Quick Danger.) meter wavelength at sea because ships’ Management equally and quickly saw masts would not support any longer the advantages of wireless to control antennas for longer wavelengths.

Fig. 3. The Marconi Company’s Cuthbert Hall in 1903 foresaw a profitable line of business in the wireless news and contracted with Cunard to make it so. Hence, the wireless news on the Cunard line’s RMS Campania in 1904. (Courtesy of David Barlow, Lizard Museum)

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A passenger diary of 1902 refers to cable. From either shore of the Atlan- this sort of vessel communication by tic, wireless (and then radio), got the noting: stories of the day to vessels plying the pond. See, for example, Fig. 4 with a “Yesterday we met Compania. Mes- map of the North Atlantic bracketed sages were sent back and forth by by Marconi towers on the first page of means of wireless telegraphy until a 1908 Cunard Daily Bulletin. they were about ninety miles apart. Compania is a much faster boat requir- ing almost two days less than this boat to cross the ocean. . . .”3

The Cunard Line (UK) contracted with the Marconi company in 1903 to broadcast news daily so its vessels could provide it to passengers. One such shipboard publication, also involv- ing the Campania, is shown in Fig. 3. These transmissions enabled the first regular “Wireless News” at sea, according to David Barlow, G3PLE, curator of the Lizard Marconi Wireless Sta- tion “LD” in Cornwall (UK).4 London newspapers and press Fig. 4. The Cunard line’s RMS Lusitania made for travel at its associations aggre- best before World War One—for rich people anyway. Stupidity doomed the passenger liner Lusitania during the war when the gated news stories, Germans torpedoed her because she carried contraband muni- and much of that got tions. At least 1,198 people thus died in May 1915, including many across the Atlantic by Americans. (Courtesy of David Barlow, Lizard Museum)

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Marconi Initiates Regular “Press” sent out a weather report or forecast Broadcasts (circa 1904) for merchant ships. The call sign used The Marconi high power station ZZ was ZZ. at Poldhu, in Cornwall, had sent out “Poldhu was used for sending the three clicks of the first transatlan- ships’ newspapers because of its high tic signal in 1901. Barlow notes its role power and significantly greater range in press operations, the first Ocean“ than the coast stations such as the News”: Lizard. It should also be noted that this traffic was sent at night to take “I have heard it said that Poldhu was advantage of night effect.”5 only an experimental and development station and was not involved As early as 1904,6 the Marconi Com- in commercial activities. This was pany supplied each ship that offered not the case as in 1903 the Marconi its Oceanic News with an on-board Company came to an agreement with printer and pressman, in the employ Cunard to send the Cunard Daily of the company, to produce it by let- Bulletin from Poldhu and Glace Bay terpress. According to the 1904 report, [Canada] daily. The first idea for a financial houses, railroads, steamship ships newspaper came from Marconi companies, and any “good house” himself while returning from New could buy an advertisement for a mini- York on board the SS St. Paul in 1899. mum $100 “card.” The first issue of the The ship received news of the progress Oceanic News was expected to cost of the Boer War . . . $14,000 to produce. (Both amounts “In October 1903 the first ship’s were relatively princely sums in those daily newspaper was published on days.) The expenditures would per- board the SS Lucania. This may well mit the advertisers and producers of have been sent from Poldhu because the news to reach the well-off “salon” an agreement had been reached with travelers on the Atlantic run, some the Cunard Company that the Cunard 125,000 in 1903. Among other items Daily Bulletin would be sent from for them, daily market quotations for Poldhu and Glace Bay in an attempt 43 “universal stocks” would appear. to cover the Atlantic Ocean. . . . Relays from ship to ship updated the “By 1910 it is known that from data and news. The Marconi Company one AM for 45 minutes Poldhu was founded this 1904 project on the suc- sending Ocean News, the nightly cessful tests of wireless for news at news bulletin. This is known because sea undertaken by the company and the Poldhu signal jammed the SOS the Reuters press agency. The Lizard between the Lizard station and the wireless station sent the press out to SS Minnehaha. The log of the Lizard an incoming ship, to the delight of all station also indicates that Poldhu also concerned.7

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Station KPH in California Sends “Press” structure with a vertical fan antenna. for the Pacific (circa 1912) Thus, it was well within the realm of In California, the possibility of trans- technical and commercial possibility mitting news to ships at sea at the turn to reach Hawaii circa 1905 (it did hap- of the last century made for a business pen in 1910). opportunity for the Pacific routes as An extant audio recording of a well. In 1905, the projected Mt. Tamal- press spark transmission circa 1910, pais wireless station (as it happens, sab- likely intended to be heard at sea, otage kept it off the air) saw a maritime has been unearthed by David Ring, news service as a revenue source: N1EA, a principal of the Radio Officers Group. This Morse code transmission “Wireless Station On Tamalpais [—] was probably recorded shoreside in Communication To Be Had With San Francisco on an Edison cylinder Ships 2000 Miles Out At Sea[:] The machine, and perhaps at the sending Pacific Wireless Telegraph Company station, callsign “TG.” A Nevada boxing has the project in hand. It expects to match is its subject (Nevada permitted have this wireless plant and a similar betting, then and now). It reads: one on a high mountain peak near Honolulu, in complete working order “Joe Jeffries owes Jack Johnson a inside of a few months. The officers good deal of money. That is he has of the company feel confident of their made a fortune through his rela- ability to make the wireless plant a tions with the colored champion. In complete success in every way. It is fact the Californian has cleaned up believed that it will be possible to $62218.28 since Nov 17 all because the communicate with all the wireless negro fighter insisted that the retired equipped vessels with a radius of champion agree to meet him in a fistic 2000 or more miles. It is expected contest . . .”9 that every one of the Oriental and Australian Mail Steamships will be Earle Ennis, a western wireless equipped with wireless telegraph pioneer, owned and operated San apparatus, and that on these ships a Francisco’s Western Wireless Equip- daily newspaper of a few pages con- ment Company and its wireless sta- taining the condensed doings of the tion TG (see Fig. 5).10 It broadcast from world furnished from the Tamalpais the Adam Grant building on Market station will be published.”8 Street in San Francisco. The entire 15-round prizefight in Reno got on Marconi’s Poldhu station in 1901 the air via station TG, especially for had bridged the approximately 2,000 nearby ships at sea. (That’s where most miles to Newfoundland. The high- professional wireless receivers were power “Mt Tam” station replicated its floating around at the time.) Ellery W.

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Fig. 5. Earle Ennis pioneered radio with his San Francisco station TG in 1910. He also first communicated by wireless with an aircraft that same year. (Jane Morgan, Electronics in the West, 1967, p. 35)

Stone, later the assistant radio inspector K.W. station at San Francisco, sent for the U.S. Department of Commerce out the news of Johnson’s victory.”11 at San Francisco recognized the importance of the story of the radio art and The San Francisco Chronicle em- reported this to Modern Electrics: ployed wireless to hear from ships about to come into port. This was “The returns were also received by known to all as “the shipping news” several ships out at sea, among them when the newspapers published this being the Oceanic Steamship Com- information. The vessels then, it is a fair pany’s liner ‘Sierra’ on her way to inference, wanted to hear from their San Francisco from Honolulu, whose ports of call and homeports if feasible operator gave out the fight bulletins about the news of the day, financial ups to the passengers as soon as they were and downs, and sporting events. The received. . . . later Hillcrest [PH] the Chronicle used a spark station circa U.W. [United Wireless] Co.’s big 15 1910 with the call letters “CH.” Also

148 The AWA Review Lee in San Francisco, the United Wireless town. Press was sent by station KPH Company used station callsign PH for at 12:30 every morning. All ships cop- its initial location at the Palace Hotel ied the press. If you missed a portion, in 1905, which it vacated as a result of it was always possible to get a fill-in the San Francisco earthquake in 1906. from some other ship, sooner or later. PH became KPH and migrated to what On passenger ships the news was is now Daly City, on a hill south of San mimeographed on an insert sheet, Francisco, around 1912. KPH soon placed in a magazine section called became the main West Coast maritime the “ocean wireless news” and station. American Marconi assumed sold for ten cents a copy. The wireless ownership of this station in 1912 company supplied the mimeograph, after United Wireless went bankrupt. ink, stencils, magazine section, and While United Wireless first exploited the inserts. A different magazine sec- this business opportunity up to 1912, tion was used each day. This section American Marconi extended it there- contained advertisements from mer- after. KPH migrated northcirca 1920 chants on the Pacific Coast, Hawaiian to the then RCA, high power, transpa- Islands, Australia, and the Orient. It cific locations at Bolinas and Pt. Reyes, was a good profitable source of income California in Marin County. for the Marconi Wireless Telegraph Circa 1912, Station KPH sent out Co. Besides, they received half of the “press” daily at midnight on 600 meters proceeds of the ten cents per copy from a hilltop south of San Francisco obtained by selling the paper aboard in what is now Daly City. The press ship. Multiply this by thousands of had been aggregated earlier from the passengers and hundreds of ships and San Francisco newspapers. Shipboard it was good business. operators in the Pacific would then “However, the ship’s operators had turn this traffic into the Ocean Wire- requested consideration of a more less News. If a ship’s radioman did not equitable division of the profits, and get all the detail from the 00:30 Morse they were right. This request was code broadcast, other shipboard opera- under consideration, but it was also tors nearby would supply fill-ins. Rich- under a slow bell. Some of the boys ard Johnstone, who went to work as a improvised a method of duplicating young wireless operator in 1912 (and inserts to bolster their share of the who much later served as a principal of profit, without the approval of the the Society of Wireless Pioneers, after Marconi Company, and the requested retiring from RCA and then the Navy) increase was never granted. If the ship so reported many years later: was to sell 300 papers, the amount to turn in to the wireless company “The daily press aboard ship was was fifteen dollars. The other fifteen just as important and exciting as the dollars was divided between the two arrival of the daily train in a small operators making their total salary

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for the month $47.50. Apparently letters CH were sent using the Morse everything was in favor of the Mar- sequence ‘----’ (four dashes). This is coni Co.” 12 not commonly used these days except among Spanish speaking operators. New York Herald Station WHB Provides The word PLUNGED is actually Press in the Near Atlantic (as Early as somewhat ambiguous. The manual 1909) sending was good throughout, with A 1915 Morse code spark signal press a slight swing, but easy to copy. Only broadcast to ships resides on a record- PLUNGED makes any sense here, ing in the AWA archives. TheNew York referring to ‘Plunging’ (investing Herald station WHB transmitted this heavily) into the stock market or press traffic in 1915 to ships at sea. The stocks plunging in value.” late Jim Maxwell, W6CF, analyzed it in a note for the California Historical Maxwell concluded: “Overall, it Radio Society about copying WHB, seems as if a report was being given as recorded by Charles Apgar, 2MN, of a missing bank clerk who had been in 1915: playing the races and the stock market. Too bad we don’t have more informa- “Here’s the text of the WHB transmis- tion on it.” Of course, such a story com- sion: ‘Mny k bt investigation shows ing out of the wireless cabin would also missing bank clerk Henry Bradley alert the captain and the purser of a merchants natl bank short hundred potential fugitive aboard, irrespective fifty thousand played races plunged of any on-board newspaper. All such stox.’” 13 officers surely remembered Dr. Crip- pin’s capture by wireless in 1910. Maxwell noted that this Morse was The New York Herald wireless sta- hand sent and that the recording starts tion has been an interest of Professor in the middle of a transmission: Noah Arceneaux in the School of Jour- nalism and Media Studies at San Diego “It isn’t clear what was going on prior State University: to the BT (break or pause). MNY is a common abbreviation for ‘many’ “Station WHB[:] . . . the [New York] and K is an invitation to transmit. It Herald established a permanent sta- is possible that this represents a frag- tion in 1909 . . . . The station, known ment of a conversation between the first as OHX, broadcast news twice operators prior to going on with the a day, with each transmission last- news. The entire transmission seems ing approximately fifteen to twenty somewhat informal—note the use of minutes, and claimed that its signal the abbreviation NATL for National, extended 1,500 miles. Following the and STOX probably for STOCKS. In Radio Act of 1912, the government the word MERCHANTS the two began to assign call letters to stations,

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and WHB became the new moniker. news (and a passenger list). One such (The H did not stand for theHerald, sheet is dated March 19th, 1914. The however, as other New York stations front cover for the booklet carrying were also assigned call letters that the sheet displays a color picture of an began with the WH prefix.)”14 ocean liner at sea with a tugboat along- side, signed by the artist “O’Malley” at Professor Noah Arceneaux adds: the bottom of picture. TheNews carried “A book on wireless telegraphy pub- many advertisements, mostly for hotels, lished in 1912 contains two photos of suggesting that at least some passengers the Herald station.”15 One shows an did not make hotel reservations until unnamed operator inside the control well underway. It was likely cheaper room; another shows the exterior of to do so by ship’s wireless than trans- the station, located at the Battery, the oceanic cable. southern tip of Manhattan. Two massive Around 1914, the regular at-sea horizontal antennas dominate the sky- newspaper with wireless traffic con- line. The book provides no additional tent evolved. The noted radio author- information on the Herald, although ity, Dr. Adrian Peterson of Adventist one paragraph citing Alfred P. Morgan World Radio (AWR), writes on this addresses the general phenomenon of development: wireless stations operated by the press: “In the very early years, there was a “‘Several enterprising newspapers ship newspaper with the title ‘Aero- have recognized the value of wire- gram.’ In 1915, due to commercial less telegraphy in collecting shipping buy-outs in the United States, the news and have installed outfits for the name was changed to ‘Ocean Wireless assistance of their reporting bureau. News’ and this was made available to This innovation in modern journal- many ships plying the coastal passen- ism has quickly developed into a use- ger trade along the eastern seaboard ful feature of those publications who of North America.”18 have seen fit to adopt it. When the baseball season is under way every The Conrad Archive notes about its steamship within calling distance 1915 copy of the Ocean Wireless News: wants the latest baseball scores or sporting results.’”16 “A colour monthly containing travel articles, marine items, and light In the years before World War One, humour, supplemented by daily the Ocean Wireless News,17 published news inserted by wireless operators, by Marconi Publishing, New York, The Ocean Wireless News: A Journal had laid in a folded sheet with “News for Travellers was published by the Received Direct by Marconi Wireless,” Wireless Press Company of New including a weather forecast and press York between 1899 and 1925, when

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it merged with Popular Radio. The of 1915, it sold for ten cents a copy. magazine, which advertised itself as (As of 1931, with the advent of the ‘The First Wireless Newspaper,’ was depression, it went out of business.) available on American steamship An elegant lady passenger of the lines as well as by subscription.”19 As day appeared on a cover of the Ocean

Fig. 6. A uniformed Marconi messenger boy appears, winged like Mercury, the messenger of the gods. A lady of elegance and means glances at him from the corner of her eye as he salutes her and says: “Marconigram for you, Miss.” Her valise looks full. Is she about to embark? Is she on board? Is the message from her husband? Perhaps her fiance’ ? (Courtesy of Joe Knight)

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Wireless News in this pre-war era (see the art in the mid-1920s for maritime Fig. 6). This undated cover exemplifies stations and most others. These evacu- the era of first class travel and service ated “bottles” powered the antennas before World War One, in the decade that then sent the “press” winging of the Lusitania and the Titanic. The through the ether. Smaller vacuum cover is itself a droll advertisement for tubes had already made possible the the pleasing convenience of receiving regenerative receivers that could copy (and sending) Marconigrams at sea, traffic from very far away, especially on facilitated by a winged boy-Mercury the shorter wavelengths. Then the later messenger. The Marconi Company stable superheterodyne circuit radios was ever alive to the prospects of rev- predominated after the mid-1930s, for enue from its new technology, which voice as well as Morse code. Until the enhanced both performance and its 1920s, spark was king; after that it was bottom line. only a technological ghost. Various styles of wireless news continued to inform passengers of the Short Wave Radio, Powered by “press” on almost every shipping line. Vacuum Tubes, Became the Etheric For a while after World War One, the Medium for Wireless News at Sea news traveled through the ether on spark signals, as did almost all the other The Transition From Spark to wireless traffic. (The U.S. Navy used Continuous Waves (“CW”) Federal Telegraph Company arcs of up The exigencies of the Great War had to a million watts of peak power after accelerated vacuum tube technol- the first working arc was used at Fed- ogy. After the war, amateurs explored eral’s San Francisco station FS in 1912.)20 wavelengths “two hundred meters Federal also saw the revenue opportu- and down,” i.e., the short waves above nities in providing the wireless news 1,500 KHz. Marconi also turned to short to passengers on Federal-equipped wave radio. The radio art, especially in vessels (see Fig. 7). Beginning in the its maritime aspects, took advantage of 1920s, short wave CW transmitters and these developments. Transoceanic and receivers using vacuum tubes provided even worldwide range became routine the wireless news for passenger liners. as a result of ionospheric propagation. Wireless news, particularly about the Morse code communication to ships at markets and sporting events of interest sea became much more reliable. Shore to the well-off, was a perquisite and told stations automated traffic such as press of luxury travel in the Roaring Twenties. and weather. Short wave radio, powered Mundane news of the day also circu- by vacuum tubes, became the etheric lated in the same way. These magazines medium for wireless news at sea in the or newspaper-like sheets of inserts also decades after World War One. Vacuum generated revenue from advertisements tube transmitters became the state of and in many cases from sales.

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Fig. 7. The Federal Telegraph Company contracted with shipping lines in the Pacific to provide wireless telegraph service to ships at sea using its Poulson arc system. Federal appears to have sent wireless news on a daily basis for shipboard publication in its Federal Radio News publication for passengers. Dating from 1921, this cover shows a Ceylonese canal, perhaps to encourage travel on that route. (Courtesy of History San Jose and Joe Knight who found it in the Archives there)

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Colorful Newspapers Please Passengers Association and from the Sydney Eve- and Generate Revenues ning Post. This vessel and its sister ships Dr. Peterson describes the format of plied the sea-routes to San Francisco via post-war wireless news publications, Tahiti from Sydney. The radio-room which is consistent with wireless news stayed tuned to Australia even on the publications discussed in the following Tahiti to San Francisco leg of the voy- paragraphs: age. The relevant time zones are shown on the back cover of the Wireless News “In those days, a cover was printed on in Fig. 11; this would be particularly land, often in color and with lots of useful, perhaps, in sending a wireless advertising, and this was made avail- message for a hotel reservation. It is able in bulk to ships equipped with likely that the passengers hailed mostly a wireless receiver and some form from Australia. The news of the day of printing press. The inside section shows up on the last pages of the maga- of the ship newspaper was compiled zine (see Fig. 12). from up to date reports received For these booklets, wireless opera- on the wireless equipment, it was tors on the vessels took down “the inserted into the color cover, and the press” from one or more shore stations, newspaper was sold to passengers.”21

The Australian vessel RMS Makura published one such edition of the Wire- less News. The cover of this land-printed 1927 Wireless News was graced with a 1926 nautical painting by C. B. Nor- ton (see Fig. 8). Amalgamated Wireless Australasia, Ltd. provided this 36-page booklet aboard the Makura. The following words ran as a footer on the cover advertising Amalgamated Wire- less: “An Ocean Newspaper Published On Board By Amalgamated Wireless (Australasia) Ltd, Sydney.” The crew inserted the news reports aboard. An internal advertisement for the news with the words, “The Morning News of Sea Travel,” is reproduced in Fig. 9. Fig. 8. Colorful covers, here a painting from The internal logo for theWireless News nautical artist C. B. Norton, and pre-printed advertisements enveloped the few pages of appears as Fig. 10. this 1927 edition of the Wireless News; the news The wireless operators sourced insert was prepared from received radio trans- the news from the Australian Press mission of “press.” (Author’s collection)

Volume 30, 2017 155 The Wireless News paragraph by paragraph. This booklet sea. With “press” reliably anticipated, also lists all of the passengers (early the passenger lines could sell advertise- “networking” perhaps), and it advertises ments in their booklets from businesses goods and services. It notices shipboard in ports of call. events and gives port information. Only Another edition of the Wireless radio could reach the ships at sea and News resides in the collections of the garner the revenue derived from the Australian Victoria Museum (see demand for current news, especially Fig. 13). This is a “Souvenir Edition” financial reports, although cables might of the Wireless News published for the still supplement radio internationally. Australian Commonwealth Line of Shore stations competed with each Steamers, specifically the TSS Jervis other by providing “press” to ships at Bay, according to the museum. As this

Fig. 9. The 1927 Wireless News as printed carried this internal advertisement. These vessels steam along under their 600-meter wavelength antennas. Note inset map of worldwide routes. (Author’s collection)

Fig. 10. This logo within the 1927 Wireless News perhaps illustrates the company’s passenger liners coming and going. In those days only a boat could get in or out of Australia. The mineral and other wealth of the island continent sustained luxury travel. (Author’s collection)

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Fig. 11. The back cover on this 1927 Wireless News shows time zones around the world. This not only made for a colorful back cover, it also facilitated timing for passenger radio communications to ports. It may be that this was a standard annular back cover illustration with particular routes appearing in the center—why else Bombay, London and Rio clocks? (Author’s collection)

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Fig. 12. Part of the news of the day from the May 11, 1927, Wireless News. Passengers learned among other important news that the Mexican Federales fought it out with the Yaqui Indians 60 miles south of the Arizona border; this may have had special import to Australians with mining interests. London, New York, and Australian cities provided other datelines. (Author’s collection)

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Fig. 13. This 1928 edition of the Wireless News also boasts a painting by nautical artist C. B. Norton, and a likely notional clipper ship. Its news issued as the ship transited the Strait of Gibraltar. (Museums Victoria, http://museumvictoria.com.au/collections/items/1125171/ magazine-the-wireless-news-the-wireless-press-1928)

Volume 30, 2017 159 The Wireless News vessel passed Gibraltar (April 7, 1928), it The RMS Niagara mentioned by printed this particular issue’s inserts. A Dr. Peterson also sailed for the Union color image of the steamer appears on Steamship Company on the Vancouver the blue front cover. One “A. G. Maclau- run, so this detail is company adver- rin,” likely a passenger, wrote his name tisement, sort of a “two-fer” in the on the cover. Ship interiors, points of commissioning of a nautical painting interest in ports, results of activities, a by the steamship line. Dr. Peterson passenger list, and a page of signatures also notes: from other passengers appear in this issue of the Wireless News.22 “A 1925 version of the ‘Ocean Wireless Illustrating the transition to tubes News’ features a color cover, drawn by from spark, the Victoria Museum notes: an artist and showing passengers and “In September 1926 Jervis Bay became crew making ready to depart at the the first ship on the UK to Australia beginning of a voyage. This particu- route to be equipped with a short-wave lar edition was distributed on board radio transmitter—a self-oscillator the SS Manchuria which was built in type using two Marconi T250 valves Camden, New Jersey in 1904 and at enabling the ship to be in constant the time, it was in passenger service radio-to-shore contact.”23 with the Panama Pacific Company C. B. Norton also painted the TSS in the Americas.”25 Jervis Bay nautical scene on this cover. A three-masted clipper ship sails off the Dr. Peterson’s article continues: port side, which must have been quite a sight as late as 1928. The left-side post “The Canadian Pacific Company bindings are probably original, because operated a large fleet of passenger the RMS Makura souvenir booklet is and cargo vessels across both the bound similarly. Atlantic and the Pacific. The same Dr. Peterson also notes an earlier name, the ‘Wireless Press,’ was used RMS Makura publication of the Wire- for all of their shipboard newspapers less News: regardless of the ship and its service area. For example, the SS Montcalm “Another example of a ship newspa- was in the Atlantic passenger service per was a daily edition of ‘The Wire- and the ‘Duchess of Richmond’ was less News’ on board the ship ‘Makura,’ a cruise ship that voyaged to many sailing across the Pacific. This ship destinations; and the name of their was built in Glasgow, Scotland and it shipboard newspapers in both cases, was operated by the Union Steamship was ‘Wireless Press.’”26 Company of New Zealand. The outer cover of this paper, in an issue dated Examples are known of the Cana- in 1923, shows a photo of another ves- dian Pacific Line’s “Wireless Press” sel plying the Pacific, the Niagara.‘ ’”24 issued aboard the RMS Montrose and

160 The AWA Review Lee the RMS Empress of France in 1930, Japanese Vessels Provide Passengers probably because a passenger pre- with Radio Press served them.27 The RMS Montrose edi- Dr. Peterson also mentions the Japanese tion identifies its source as “Canadian N.Y.K. line (Nippon Yusen Kabushiki Pacific News-Radio.” Kaisha), printing “the information The sorts of news that appeared in received by radio from Japan.” He the various at-sea publications implies concludes: “The list of ship newspa- that the passengers were international- pers produced from news transmitted ists and cosmopolitans, which could in Morse code by wireless and in voice also be inferred just from the price of by radio is almost endless.”29 passage. According to Dr. Peterson: Before World War Two, Japanese passenger vessels also traversed the “The issue of ‘Wireless Press’ for Pacific and called at Asian ports. The Tuesday April 6, 1937 shows that Asama Maru, for example, sailed in the ‘Duchess of Richmond’ was on the trans-Pacific Orient and California a Christian World Cruise. The sin- fortnightly service to San Francisco. gle sheet newspaper, derived again The N.Y.K. line built her and sister from radio reports, gives an inside ships in Japan for this route. (N.Y.K. view to world events at the time. still sails the Pacific.) “The Queen of Among these 1937 news events are the Sea” sobriquet applied to the Asama the following: Maru; nonetheless, in the war Allied forces sank her (1944) and almost all • The weather in London is foggy, and of the Japanese liners that had served the temperature was just 41 degrees. pre-war.30 • The Earl of Clarendon arrived in The JapaneseWireless JiJi Press from London at the end of a six year term the N.Y.K. line in 1935 provided news as governor of South Africa. and articles. (Jiji means “Times.”) For • The Crown Prince of Hedjaz, Emir example, Figs. 14–15 are mastheads Sand, has just concluded a state visit appearing in an issue dated June 24, to Baghdad. 1935. The column under the masthead • Two minutes of silence was observed in Japanese is about war. This four-page in Dublin for members of the Irish Wireless Jiji Press issued on 11" by 17" Brigade killed in Spain. newsprint paper in the fourth year of • New Delhi reports heavy rains in Emperor Hirohito’s reign and is so the North West Frontier and the dated in Japanese.31 Reading from the border regions of Afghanistan. left, the first two pages are in English. • Federal Securities are sold on the Reading from the right, those first two open market in the United States pages are in Japanese. The English con- at 3% below par. tent appears to be fill, as does much of • An airplane is taking off for a record the Japanese. In English it says on the flight from Tokyo to London.”28 first page: “A Newspaper Issued Daily

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Fig. 14. For the Japanese N.Y.K. line, the Wireless Jiji Press came out on newsprint, mostly pre- prepared with fill, but issued daily. Wireless( Jiji Press, June 24, 1935; author’s collection)

Fig. 15. The Japanese language predominated in the content of the 1935 Wireless Jiji Press, although English provided the “fill,” perhaps as a way for Japanese passengers to sharpen their language skills. (Wireless Jiji Press, June 24, 1935; author’s collection)

On Board N.Y.K. Liners.” A daily sheet radio antennas that ordinarily cannot of radio news would seem to be missing. be seen in panoramic photographs of An advertisement in the Jiji Press ships.32 It too did not survive the war. shows maritime traffic to China played a role in N.Y.K.’s revenues (see Fig. 16). Radio Press and Shipboard Newspapers Every four days one of the steamers in World War Two and After sailed to China. As little as one day on The “press,” in the form of wireless the China Sea (24 hours) put a Japanese news, went to ships at sea during World businessman in Shanghai. (In those War Two. Passengers and crew kept days Japanese imperial ambitions ran abreast of war developments. The Brit- high.) The war claimed both of the ish Wireless Marine Service in World advertised liners. A mine sank the War Two informed British shipping Nagasaki Maru in 1942, and a colli- (and anyone within radio range) of war sion sank the Shanghai Maru in 1943. progress. As indicated in the masthead The Japanese navy converted another of a message from the Marine Service liner, the Kashiwara Maru, into an air- reproduced in Fig. 18, the Marconi craft carrier (see Fig. 17). The artist has International Marine Communications enhanced his image by emphasizing the Company, the Radio Communication

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Fig. 16. This sort of advertisement for Chinese travel in the 1935 Wireless Jiji Press sheds light on Japanese imperial ambitions for China in the 1930s. (Wireless Jiji Press, June 24, 1935; author’s collection)

Fig. 17. The Kashiwara Maru never sailed as the 1930s ocean liner of this artist’s conception, but this dramatic scene does illustrate the radio antennas of the liners of the day. The vessel ended up as an aircraft carrier and did not make it through the war. (Painting by David “Alan” Urban, Jr. as “carsdude,” courtesy DeviantArt.com)

Company, and a third Marconi com- defeat of the Graf Spee pocket battleship pany had been amalgamated. This frag- in South America early in the war. Mer- ment of 1939 wireless press reports the chant marine radiomen reported the

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Fig. 18. “To-Day’s News” appears on the 1939 masthead of “press” for newspapers at sea provided by the Marconi British Wireless Marine Service during World War Two. (Courtesy of David Barlow, Lizard museum) location of Graf Spee, at serious risk to equator, known at sea as “Crossing the themselves and their vessels, enabling Line,” which was celebrated by “shell- the British Navy to find and engage her. backs,” who had done it in various ways The radiomen on U.S. Navy vessels before, and usually unpleasant for “pol- took a great deal of press and similar liwogs,” who had not. The orders antici- traffic, turning it into typed and mim- pated opposition in the Royal Domain eographed multipage newspapers at sea. of King Neptune Rex and set a special One example is The Pelio ‘Sea Horse’— watch. The survival of this particular the “Radio Press” of the USS Pelias (see at-sea newspaper may owe itself to a Fig. 19). This submarine tender fought at then newly christened shellback. Pearl Harbor on the first day of the war, In the 1950s, a sailors’ union, the “splashing” at least one attacking Japa- American Radio Association, CIO sent nese aircraft. On Monday, June 29, 1942, out press for its members at sea in the she was about to cross the equator on marine bands, 8 MHz and 17 MHz: her way to Australia. She supplied her “This Press may be copied, free, for crew with more than six pages of war posting aboard ship or in Union Halls; and national news, including sports, may be reproduced if credit is given the baseball scores, and commentary. to: ‘Press Broadcast of ARA, CIO,’ or At least 30 paragraphs of war news bear just ARA Press.”33 The heading reads: attributions to cities such as Washing- “Note change of West Coast Skeds [,] ton, London, Moscow, Bombay, and Switch from 16 MC to 17 MC band[,] Cairo. An insert conveyed general Inform all Ships of these Skeds.”34 San orders for the upcoming transit of the Francisco’s station KTK covered the

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Fig. 19. The “Radio Press” for this Navy subtender in 1942 in its shipboard publication, the Sea Horse, provided considerable international information to the officers and crew in the early days of U.S. involvement in the war when the outcome remained in doubt. (Author’s collection)

Pacific, and WCO on Long Island, NY, covered the Atlantic. The logo “ARA On the Air” appearing on the notice is reproduced in Fig. 20.

Linotype Machines Aboard Liners Brought Wireless News to Shoreside Standards Every significant passenger vessel provided its passengers wireless news Fig. 20. Unions could hardly count on corporate every day from the 1920s and there- newspapers to carry union news, or even to after. Popular culture, even in fiction, treat unions fairly. The merchant marine radio quickly recognized the importance of operators’ union, the American Radio Associa- the currency of the “wireless news,” tion (ARA) in the 1950s, took up the slack with as did the maritime industries. Alfred its own ocean-going press broadcast from the East and West Coasts on the marine long- Noyes, poet and author, wrote The Last distance bands. (American Radio Association, Voyage, a sea-going novel in 1930 ring- ARA Log, Jan. and Feb. 1953, p. 5) ing with drama:

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“The Last Voyage begins at night in letters. After each line of text was mid-Atlantic, where an ocean liner, assembled, a metal cast of the line, ‘a great ship like a lighted city,’ is known as a “slug”, would be taken battling through a raging storm. A and was then used to compose the little girl is mortally ill. The ship’s columns and pages in readiness for surgeon prepares to operate, but printing. Linotype machines had nev- with little hope of success, for the er been used on board a liner before, case is complicated and he is no spe- so that ingenious tests with machines cialist. Luckily, the captain knows on rollers had to be conducted on land from the wireless news that a top to replicate conditions at sea and en- specialist from Johns Hopkins is sure the technology would function on another liner 400 miles away— adequately.”36 within wireless range. The ship’s surgeon will be able to consult him, and Today, cruise ships (and the few stay in touch with him throughout remaining liners) still provide daily the operation. Suddenly, the little newspapers via satellite, complete girl’s chances of survival are much with full-page images from all over improved.” 35 the world. Passenger lines continued to take press traffic from the coast radio For the benefit of passengers want- stations of Europe, North America, and ing to keep up with the wireless news, Asia well into the 1960s. as well as for facilitation of their own The coming of satellites made for hospitality operations, many ships were the replacement of long antennas with equipped with printing machines of squat parabolic dishes, as the frequen- various types to print wireless newspa- cies moved up from 500 KHz (600 pers, menus and the like. They also car- meters) to the gigahertz ranges at cen- ried press-men and printers (including timeter wavelengths. (Vacuum tubes, Marconimen in the early days). But it too, are long gone.) With the coming of was the UK Daily Mail with its Atlan- so much bandwidth, the wireless news tic edition of 1923 that pioneered the at sea evolved to near photographic shoreside technology of the linotype copies of the world’s newspapers, local machine at sea. advertisements and all. See Fig. 21 for a current shipboard advertisement “The installation of linotype ma- for shipboard newspapers. Although chines on the ships was the techni- the transport of well-off passengers cal innovation that made the Atlantic became the business of the airlines, the edition possible. Whereas typesetters tourist cruises picked up much of the traditionally set the text by hand— slack. It still made sense to advertise to letter-by-letter—a linotype machine them and to cater to the need they felt allowed the operator to use a key- to stay fully informed, even on luxury board that mechanically selected the vacations. 37

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Fig. 21. This is a copy of a current shipboard advertisement on a cruise ship for newspaper service at sea. Full issues of the major newspapers of the world are available by subscription for the length of the cruise. The data comes down from satellites (although not printed in color). Satellite communication is generally reliable except near the poles where the angle to the equatorial satellites is too low. Perhaps there’s something to be said for legacy radio after all. (Author’s collection)

Conclusion primary applications would be mari- The very phrase “the wireless news” time, only later to be followed by came to stand for new knowledge of the competition with the transoceanic events of the day, the only immediate cables. Maritime interests would pay source for which was the radio—or in for immediate communications, and British parlance, the wireless. A more their passenger would pay for news at complete newspaper report of impor- sea. The economists say supply creates tant events came only with the next demand but also that demand creates dawn, at sea as well as ashore. Mar- supply. The new technology supplied coni knew his new wireless telegraphy’s immediate news of events ashore, and

Volume 30, 2017 167 The Wireless News the willingness of passengers to pay mann, “Ship Newspapers and Passenger Life for it drove both the radio art and the Aboard Transoceanic Steamships in the Late Nineteenth Century” (citations omitted) in printing art. the Journal [of] Transcultural Studies, Num- Marconi’s new technology gave ber 1, (2012), published by the [University of birth to the wireless news at sea very Heidelberg] Cluster of Excellence ‘Asia and shortly after wireless telegraphy first Europe in a Global Context: The Dynamics of Transculturality’[!] of the Ruprecht-Karls- itself travelled over water. The then big Universität Heidelberg. http://heiup.uni-hei- business of passenger lines sustained delberg.de/journals/index.php/transcultural/ its growth for both the Atlantic’s and index. 3. This quote comes from the 1902 diary of Otelia the Pacific’s well-off passengers. The Langum on a voyage on the Cunard Line’s various, often colorful issues of the Saxsonia, back to America by way of Liver- Wireless News record for us not only pool, UK. The ships exchanged messages on the third day of her nine-day crossing. Larry the events of the day, but also tell us Nutting, K7KSW, CHRS, supplied a copy of the of the social world of travel through relevant part of the diary. His wife, the grand- the decades. daughter of Ms. Langum, had transcribed the From Marconi’s 1899 maritime diary. 4. Originally almost all Marconi stations used call adventures and the first 1899 wireless signs to show their locations. The Lizard was transmission in America (in San Fran- LD, although nearby Poldhu was ZZ. Marconi cisco from the Lightship 70 announc- stations soon added an “M” prefix. Thus, the Lizard station became MLD. Later post office ing the return of the troopship USS ownership changed the call sign to GLD. Today Sherman to San Francisco newspapers), the Amateur Radio Club at Lizard uses GB2LD radio communications and journal- for special events. See Bobby Lyman, “The Lizard Radio Station ~ The Oldest Surviv- ism have quickly informed the world ing Wireless Station in the World,” Antique of events worldwide. From its earli- Wireless Classified, (Feb. 2009), http://www est day to the present, radio has also .antiqueradio.com/Feb09_Lyman_Lizard informed otherwise isolated seafarers .html. 5. David Barlow, “Poldhu – ZZ GB100ZZ,” Pol- and passengers of events at home and dhu Amateur Radio Club, G B 2 G M, News- abroad. Radio and news are a natural letter, #80, (June 2, 2014), pages 11 ff. See marriage. That marriage, now poly- also http://www.lizardwireless.org/. Curator Barlow not only kindly provided a number technological, thrives throughout the of the British images appearing in this note electromagnetic spectrum, spark long but also earlier provided a thorough tour of gone but now through satellites above. the reconstructed Lizard Marconi station, for both of which I am grateful. 6. “The First Mid-Ocean Daily,” San Francisco Endnotes Chronicle, (May 1, 1904), at page 2. This 1. Degna Marconi, My Father Marconi (1962), appears to have been a widely distributed page 83. The official history of the Marconi story, with graphics, for later publication in International Marine Communications Com- local newspapers, in part because the internal pany, by H. E. Hancock, Wireless at Sea (1950) graphic of The Marconigram is dated May 21— tells the same story and reports the same traf- perhaps the Chronicle jumped the journalistic fic at page 22 virtually word-for-word and gun. notes the newspaper memorialized by a then- 7. “Wireless News at Sea: Successful Experiment,” standing monument on the Isle of Wight. Daily Telegraph [London], (Feb. 11, 1903); 2. Roland Wenzlhuemer and Michael Offer- reproduced in Papers Past [,] Wireless News

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At Sea, from the New Zealand newspaper Auk- Telegraphy, 1899–1917,” American Journal- land Star, (April 4, 1904). https://paperspast ism, Volume 30, Number 2, (2013), page 174. .natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/all. 15. The book that Professor Arceneaux quotes is: 8. “Wireless Station On Tamalpais,” Sau- Alfred P. Morgan, Wireless Telegraphy and salito [California] News, (Sept. 2, 1905), Telephony Simply Explained, (Norman Henley Internet sourced by Barry McMullan, Publishing Co., New York, 1913). CHRS. https://cdnc.ucr.edu/cgi-bin/ 16. Ibid., pages 95–96. cdnc?a=d&d=SN19050902.2.19. 17. Ocean Wireless News, Volume IX, Num- 9. See Ellery W. Stone, “Returns From Fight Sent ber 2, (March, 1914) from a current book- By Wireless,” Modern Electrics, Volume 3, seller’s advertisement: https://www.abe Number 5, (August 1910), page 257. The text books.com/Ocean-Wireless-News- is from the cylinder recording that may be Volume-Number-Marconi/745749169/ heard at http://www.tinfoil.com/cm-0406.htm; bd. ‘Ed’ Trump, AL7N, of Fairbanks, Alaska tran- 18. Dr. Adrian Peterson, “Radio Newspapers scribed the then American Morse code. The Aboard Ship” from the Adventist World Radio cylinder recording is in the Frank V. de Bellis AWR Wavescan, posted at http://mt-shortwave collection at San Francisco State University. .blogspot.com/2010/07/radio-newspapers- David Ring, N1EA found this remarkable aboard-ship.html. record. Dr. Adrian M. Peterson of Adventist 19. Conrad First, The Joseph Conrad Periodical World Radio found Stone’s article. “U.W. Co.” Archive, about the Conrad story “The Brute: A refers to United Wireless, operating in the Tale of a Ship That Wouldn’t Behave” published marine service from what is now Daly City. It in Ocean Wireless News for January 1912. The is possible that the transcribed text emanated Conrad Archive is a program of the University from PH, not TG, although Stone seems to be of Uppsala, Sweden. http://www.conradfirst saying PH sent out only the news of the victory .net/view/periodical?id=12536. at the end of the match. Nonetheless the text 20. Federal arc transmitters, usually 2 kW, served appears to be a prepared broadcast and not a many ships on the Pacific routes into the 1920s wireless operator extemporizing. A series of and 300 vessels of the United States Shipping numbers appears at the end of the message but Board. Federal sited its main transmitter in its intent is unknown now. Palo Alto, California. A publication, Federal 10. Jane Morgan, Electronics in the West, (1967) Radio News, A Daily News Journal for Ocean page 35. Travelers survives from 1921 in the collec- 11. Stone, op cit. tion of Joe Knight, CHRS, AWA, with a scene 12. Richard Johnstone, Commander, U.S.N.R. from Ceylon on its cover. A photograph of a (Retired), My San Francisco Story of the federal arc in a ship’s radio room is available “Waterfront and the Wireless,” (1965), pri- at: http://www.telegraph-office.com/pages/ vately printed and now in the Library of the images/Kdid.jpg. By inference, a ship equipped California Historical Radio Society, page 50. with Federal equipment took its press from 13. James A. Maxwell, [W6CF], “Copying WHB as Federal stations primarily. The arc technology Recorded by Charles Apgar, 2MN, in 1915,” did not, however, long survive the development Journal of the California Historical Radio Soci- of power vacuum tubes. ety, Volume 13, Number 1 (1994). The correct 21. Peterson, “Radio Newspapers Aboard Ship,” callsigns WHB and W6CF are emended. The op cit. audio recording comes from the archives of 22. http://museumvictoria.com.au/collections/ the Antique Wireless Association in New York, items/1125171/magazine-the-wireless-news- part of an NBC 1934 interview with Charles the-wireless-press-1928. Apgar during which two of his Edison cylinder 23. http://collections.museumvictoria.com.au/ recording were played on the air. Apgar also articles/3665. The museum adds: “On 5 recorded the then-German Sayville, L.I., NY November 1940, HMS Jervis Bay was sunk station on Edison cylinders in 1915 for U.S. in the Atlantic by the German pocket battle- authorities. ship Admiral Scheer after the convoyJervis 14. Noah Arceneaux, “News on the Air: The New Bay was escorting came under attack. Jervis York Herald, Newspapers, and Wireless Bay turned toward the Admiral Scheer and

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diverted her fire while the 38-ship convoy the World was Paper and All the Sea was HX84 which included the cargo liner Rangitiki Ink: Ships’ Printers and Printing 1890–1960 escaped. Her captain, E.F.S Fegan (a former (Draft)” (no date) at https://www.academia. commanding officer at the RAN College at edu/7882257/ . . . The disproportionate sur- Jervis Bay) was killed and the ship sank with vival of the First Class passengers of the RMS the loss of 198 men. Fegan received a posthu- Titanic tells the same story in starker terms. mous Victoria Cross for his actions during The Great Eastern, laying the Atlantic cable this engagement. . . .” in 1866 took news through the cable it laid 24. Peterson, “Radio Newspapers Aboard Ship,” down, and provided it as daily summaries op cit. of shoreside events. The information thus 25. Ibid. conveyed by lithograph related primarily to 26. Ibid. finance in London.http://atlantic-cable.com/ 27. These two issues of the Canadian Pacific line’s Article/GreatEasternDocuments/ (Shipboard Wireless Press recently appeared for sale on Publishing and Printing on Great Eastern). eBay. eBay often provides images and information not otherwise easily available. 28. Peterson, “Radio Newspapers Aboard Ship,” About the Author op cit. Bart Lee, K6VK, xKV6LEE, WPE2DLT, 29. Ibid. is a longtime member of AWA and a 30. According to Wikipedia, which supplies con- Fellow of the California Historical siderable detail about the line and the vessels. 31. I am indebted to my friend Michi Osada for Radio Society (CHRS), for which he the translations from the Japanese. serves as General Counsel Emeritus 32. Kashiwara-Maru at sea by “carsdude” (David and Archivist and an historian. He “Alan” Urban, Jr.) on DeviantArt.com cap- tioned “The Japanese liner as she was intended holds both FCC commercial (GROL before being transformed into aircraft car- with radar endorsement) and amateur rier Junyo” (enhanced here to show anten- extra class licenses. He has enjoyed nas), http://carsdude.deviantart.com/art/ kashiwara-maru-506523859. radio and radio-related activities in 33. Notice in the ARA (American Radio Associa- many parts of the world. He has in tion, CIO) ARA Log for January and February recent years spent a fair amount of time 1953. The logo says: “ARA on the Air” showing on the high seas and is thus indebted to a radio tower and a long antenna. 34. Ibid. today’s Wireless News. Radio technol- 35. From the article about Alfred Noyes in ogy and history have fascinated him Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ since he made his first crystal set with Alfred_Noyes. 36. Seth Cayley, “Publishing at sea,” in Research a razor blade and pencil lead 60 years Information [which declares itself to be] The ago. He is especially fond of those sets essential link between publishers, librarians of which it is said: Real Radios Glow and researchers (August 7, 2013). https://www .researchinformation.info/feature/publishing- in the Dark. Bart is a published author sea. This article notes that each vessel carried on legal and other subjects and exten- an Atlantic Times editor to turn the wireless sively on the history of radio. The traffic into newspaper stories. That traffic AWA presented its Houck Award for came from Massachusetts (RCA’s Chatam, MA station WCC) and Marconi in England documentation to him in 2003, and but also directly from U.K. Foreign Office CHRS presented its 1991 “Doc” Her- transmissions. rold Award to him in connection with 37. For an interesting discussion of technology, even at-sea newspapers, illuminating class his work for the Perham Foundation differences, see Teresa Breathnach, “If All Electronics Museum. In 2001, during

170 The AWA Review Lee disaster recovery operations in New Barlow, Curator of the Lizard Penin- York after the “9/11” terrorist enormity, sula Marconi Station in Cornwall, UK; he served as the Red Cross deputy com- Paula Carmody took the author photo munications lead from September 12 in Indonesia). to September 21, (the “night shift trick chief”). Bart worked as a litigator by trade, prosecuting and defending civil cases in federal and state courts for 40 years. He is a graduate of St. John’s Col- lege (the “Great Books School”) and the University of Chicago Law School. Bart invites correspondence at KV6LEE@ gmail.com. This article and the accompanying photo of the author are copyrighted by Bart Lee, 2017 but “fair use” of the article is appropriate to promote radio history. All moral rights are asserted under the Berne Convention and otherwise. (Special thanks are due to David Bart Lee

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