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"Wavescan" is a weekly program for long distance radio hobbyists produced by Dr. Adrian M. Peterson, Coordinator of International Relations for Adventist World Radio. AWR carries the program over many of its stations (including shortwave). Adrian Peterson is a highly regarded DXer and radio historian, and often includes features on radio history in his program. We are reproducing those features below, with Dr. Peterson's permission and assistance.


Wavescan N547, August 19, 2019

The Early Wireless Scene in South American Uruguay

Right at the end of this month of August, Jeff and Thais White from Radio Miami International-WRMI in Miami, Florida, are planning a visit to Montevideo in Uruguay, after the conclusion of the HFCC meetings in nearby Buenos Aires. In our Wavescan program today, we honor the Montevideo DX Group in Uruguay, and we begin a two or three part topic on the story of radio broadcasting in their country.

The South American country of Uruguay is located on the Atlantic seaboard, and it is sandwiched between Brazil and Argentina. It is the third smallest territory in South America, with an area of 68,000 square miles and a population of three and a half million people. This country has a coastline of about 400 miles, and it stretches inland about the same distance.

Their capital city is Montevideo, meaning approximately "Mountain View," and it is the third most southerly capital city in the world. Only Canberra in Australia, and Wellington in New Zealand, reach further south than Montevideo.

There is at least one question that people living in other parts of the world would ask regarding this area in South America, and that is: Why the similarity in name between Paraguay and Uruguay?

According to the authorities, both names, Paraguay and Uruguay, are variations of the original local language, Guarani. The meanings of the two country names can be described as follows:

In the pre-colonial days, South American native tribes lived in what is now called Uruguay, and the Spanish and the Portuguese were the first Europeans to visit the area, in the early 1500s. Uruguay has endured a turbulent past, and it established its own independence in 1825. Both Spanish and Guarani are the official languages of Uruguay, though Spanish is the preferred language of business and government.

Soon after the beginning of World War II, Uruguay came into prominence during the high profile events associated with the German battleship Graf Spee. Just a dozen weeks into the war, the Graf Spee was wounded in battle against British warships in the South Atlantic, and so this pride of the German Kriegsmarine sought shelter in the harbor at Montevideo, in neutral Uruguay.

Radio broadcasts from the British navy indicated, falsely, that British navy vessels were stationed in international waters outside Montevideo, ready to sink the Graf Spee should she venture out into the Atlantic. A radio message from Berlin gave Captain Hans Langsdorff two options; either flee across La Plata Estuary to nearby Buenos Aires, or scuttle in the estuary itself. He chose the latter, and exactly one week before Christmas 1939, to avoid capture, the Graf Spee was deliberately sunk, with all crew ashore.

As was the case with many other countries around the world, Uruguay began the installation of wireless stations in the early 1900s, now more than one hundred years ago. On November 12, 1904, the government of Uruguay gave formal approval for the installation of a German coastal wireless station at Punta Yeguas, on the edge of La Plata Estuary, a little west of Montevideo.

Construction work was completed two years later (1906), and a new 1 kW Telefunken wireless transmitter was taken into Morse Code service under the callsign MV, obviously identifying Montevideo. Subsequently, this callsign was modified with an initial letter U standing for Uruguay, and callsign MV became UMV.

Not to be outdone by their German competitors, the English Marconi company installed their own wireless station at Punte del Este, a very small peninsula some 80 miles east of the capital city, Montevideo. This new wireless station, also with a power of 1 kW, was inaugurated three years later, in 1909, under the callsign MO, also obviously identifying Montevideo.

It was the custom of the Marconi company back at that stage to choose the first and the last letters of the location of a land based station as the station callsign. However, subsequently, the Marconi company required all of their stations worldwide to insert an M as the first letter of their callsigns, and thus station MO Montevideo became MMO.

During the middle of the year 1912, a new government wireless station on a large 10 acre property near Cerrito, Montevideo was taken into regular service under the callsign CWA. This new coastal wireless station CWA replaced both the German Telefunken station UMV at Punta Yeguas and the English Marconi station MMO at Punta del Este.

This station was licensed also for additional subsidiary callsigns, one for each shortwave channel. These callsigns descended in alphabetic order; CWA, CWB, CWC, CWD, etc.

The well-known international radio monitor Horacio A. Nigro of Montevideo provides detailed information about the new government operated CWA. Several new buildings were erected for this new coastal wireless station; the 2.5 kW longwave spark transmitter was also made by Telefunken in Germany; the two steel antenna towers stood 200 feet tall and they were spaced 325 ft. apart; the four phosphor bronze antenna wires were more than one inch thick; and there was a counterpoise earthing system just above ground level.

The main power source was provided by the city electricity company, though there was also a backup generator system. The receiver was a new, complicated, up to date version of what was originally a simple crystal set receiver.

Back during this original wireless era, several additional wireless stations were installed at various locations throughout Uruguay, including at lighthouses, as well as at inland locations. In addition, some of the lower-powered wireless stations were mobile units that could be installed wherever a temporary location was needed.

The long time coastal wireless station CWA in Uruguay dates its earliest origins back to the year 1904, and 115 years later, after several modernizations and periodic updates, this station is still on the air to this day, and still under its original callsign CWA.

More about the radio scene in Uruguay next time.


Australian Shortwave Callsign VLR - 1

Throughout the entire one and a quarter centuries of wireless and radio history, there have ever been only two stations that have been allotted the callsign VLR. The first application of the call VLR was for the communication transmitter aboard a small passenger/cargo ship in the waters off New Zealand, and the second application of the callsign VLR was for the internationally well-known low power shortwave service operated by the ABC and Radio Australia at Lyndhurst in Victoria.

The SS Marama was built at Greenock in Scotland, and it was launched in 1907. During its 30 years of international ocean going service, it was in use for the TransTasman route between New Zealand and Australia, and in the TransPacific service between New Zealand and North America.

The normal peacetime service of the SS Marama was interrupted for a period of four years during World War I while it was in use as New Zealand's second Hospital Ship for soldiers wounded on service in Europe. On one occasion, the Marama was accosted by a German submarine in the North Atlantic, but as a hospital ship it was permitted to move on unmolested.

The Marama was laid up at Evans Bay, Wellington in 1936, and next year it was sold to China, and then sold again, this time to Japan at a nice profit. It was broken up at Osaka in Japan during the year 1938.

During the early 1920s, the callsign aboard the Marama was VLR, and this callsign was modified to ZLR on January 1, 1929 due to new international radio regulations. During the 1930s there were times when a daily newspaper was published aboard the Marama with news taken from various radio sources. This daily newspaper was given the appropriate though rather unimaginative title, Daily News.

The original VLR shortwave station in Australia was born in a galvanized iron shed on top of a low rise near Lyndhurst, some 25 miles southeast of Melbourne in Victoria, in 1928. Back then, this locally made 600 watt transmitter was operated experimentally without callsign on 5800 kHz. However, due to the fact that the audio source for this little new shortwave transmitter was taken from the two mediumwave stations in Melbourne, 3LO and 3AR, then the shortwave unit was soon afterwards given a sort of combined call, 3LR.

Due to a change in international radio regulations, amateur stations in Australia were required to add the prefix VK to their callsigns, by December 31, 1928. In order to ensure the change of callsign throughout Australia by the effective date, the Chief Radio Inspector, Mr. Jim Malone, authorized the usage of the new VK prefix from December 8 onwards. That was for all amateur radio stations.

However, mediumwave broadcasting stations in Australia never did use a prefix, just a single digit number identifying the state, followed by two letters identifying an individual station. But the radio relay station at Lyndhurst was an anomaly--it was neither an amateur station nor a mediumwave broadcasting station. According to the QSL cards that were issued during that era, the accepted callsign for Lyndhurst shortwave was simply 3LR. In this way, it was treated as a broadcasting station.

During the year 1934, a new building was constructed adjacent to the old original shack at Lyndhurst, and on March 12 shortwave 3LR began a regular relay of programming for the benefit of people living in Australia's isolated outback areas. At this stage, the transmitter was still operating at just 600 watts and the usual channel was 9580 kHz. The regular broadcast antenna was a horizontal half-wave doublet at 95.5 degrees from true north, with a radiation lobe towards the great outback.

Back during this era, the Lyndhurst transmitter with its programming relay from 3LO and 3AR, was identified officially and unofficially as both 3LR and VK3LR. In experimental usage, though, the allotted callsign was VK3XX, with the X following the American pattern identifying an experimental station. In May 1935, the 600 watt transmitter was engineered to operate then at 1 kW.

Around June 1936, transmitter (VK)3LR began to carry an experimental 10 minute bulletin of news twice weekly in French for the benefit of French islands in the South Pacific. This genuine overseas foreign language service, though quite short in duration, was a forerunner to the inauguration of Australia Calling/Radio Australia three years later. The French Consul-General in Sydney made request for the continuity of this French language service.

In 1937, the Lyndhurst transmitter was completely reconditioned and the power rating was increased to 2 kW, though still with the same original transmitter. Soon afterwards, the power level was again increased, this time to 5 kW.

At this stage, the lonely little shortwave transmitter at Lyndhurst now radiated through two antenna systems as needed; for national coverage through the same horizontal doublet, and for international coverage, a rhombic beamed on Daventry in England. December 1 (1937) was the official date for the regularization of the callsign from (VK)3LR to the now more familiar VLR.

More about VLR next time.