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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 N516, January 13, 2019

The Radio Scene in Portuguese Macau - II

Here in Wavescan last month, we presented Part 1 of the Radio Scene on Portuguese Macau, and we covered the story of their early wireless and radio broadcasting stations during the prewar years. The main radio transmitter back then was in use for both international communication as well as for the broadcast of radio programming under the consecutive callsigns CQN, CRY9 and CR8AA.

In our program today, we pick up the Macau story again at the time when the war in Asia, Japan versus China, was well under way, and it was soon to explode into the dramatic Pacific War running from 1941 to 1945. On the same day, Sunday, December 7 in Hawaii and Monday, December 8 on the western side of the International Date Line, Japanese forces made a surprise attack on several strategic locations in the Pacific, including Honolulu in Hawaii, and the island of Luzon in the Philippines, and also the British colonial territory of Hong Kong on coastal China.

Because Portugal, over in Europe, remained neutral during World War II, and because Macau was a Portuguese colony in coastal China, this small Asian territory was spared much of the devastation that overtook the Asia-Pacific arena. However, during this tragic war, Macau became a refugee center, with an estimated half million refugees flowing in from other areas of Asia.

The main influx of refugees came from mainland China, with an additional 9,000 flowing in from Hong Kong. These large migrations produced drastic shortages of food and accommodation in Macau.

Initially the Japanese authorities accepted and respected Macau's stance of neutrality during the Asia-Pacific War. However, in August 1943, Japanese troops seized a British cargo steamer at Macau, the Sian (X'ian), and this event led to the installation of Japanese advisors over the colony.

Towards the end of the Pacific War during the year 1945, American planes bombed Macau three times, for which the United States made a reparations payment of $20 million to Portugal five years later. The first American air raid took place on Tuesday, January 16 during the South China Sea Raids as part of Operation Gratitude.

At the time, United States navy vessels were passing nearby during heavy stormy weather, and their planes bombed the Naval Aviation Center on coastal Macau and destroyed the reserve tanks of aviation fuel. In addition, they also bombed a radio station on the main Macau Island. Next day, Tokyo Rose announced in English on Radio Tokyo shortwave: We don't know how you got into the area; but now, how will you get out?

We turn now to the radio scene in Portuguese Macau beginning just before the middle of last century. It was during the year 1941 that Radio Clube Macao was formed, and they inherited all of the equipment and installations of the former radio station that had been on the air under the consecutive callsigns CQN and CRY9. At this stage their operating frequency was 6070 kHz, and they were then identified with a new callsign, CR8AA.

This new callsign CR8AA gives the appearance that it was an amateur radio callsign, though in actual reality this call identified the station when it was on the air for the broadcast of news and entertainment programming. Interestingly, the international prefix CR8 would identify another Portuguese colony, Goa, in India, rather than Macau in China. However, during that era, with Asian tensions rising high, we would suggest that the Portuguese government in Europe required their shortwave station in Macau China to identify with a callsign relevant to Goa-India in order to add a touch of combined psychological strength to their distant colonies.

The studios for this pre-war shortwave station were always located on the top floor of the Post Office building in downtown Macau, and the transmitter was always located at Dona Maria Fort, Fortaleza da Dona Maria 2. This fort was constructed by the Portuguese authorities in 1852 at an isolated location on a small peninsula jutting out into the bay from the main island of Macau. The 500 watt shortwave transmitter was constructed in three separate units; the low power driver transmitter, a 500 watt amplifier, and a separate rectifier.

A photograph in a radio magazine in 1935 shows three tall masts at Fort Dona Maria, two of which were identified as supporting the zeppelin antenna that was in use for the shortwave transmissions from station CR8AA. A third mast in the photograph was not specifically identified, though we would suggest that it was in use as a receiving antenna for two way communication traffic.

There seems to be no indication that shortwave CR8AA was ever on the air with program broadcasting during the Pacific War. After the bombing of Hong Kong on December 8, 1941, there are no known monitoring observations until the station was reactivated again with program broadcasting in August 1945.

The radio station that the American planes bombed on January 16, 1945 was this historic, low powered shortwave station CR8AA at Fort Dona Maria. However, apparently the damage to the transmitter facility was not too great, because in August the station was heard again, at good strength, by Mr. R. Clack in Australia on 7530 kHz. In a monitoring report published in the Australasian Radio World, DX Editor Lawrence J. Keast commented: Radio Club Macau has made a welcome re-appearance after its long silence.

An oversized QSL card issued to a listener in Sweden for reception in December (1945) shows an artistic representation of coastal scenery in Macau. The English text on this QSL card verifies reception on 7505 kHz, though subsequently they moved again to 9300 kHz.

More about the radio scene in Macau another time.

Languages on QSL Cards

Around the world today, it is estimated, there are 7,100 living languages. The same authorities state that the population in India alone speak 880 languages, and in the Indian state of Arunachal Pradesh there are 90 different languages. The international translation organization known as the United Bible Societies states that all or part of the Holy Scriptures have been translated into more than 3324 languages (and also dialects, we would suggest).

The most widely spoken language on Earth is English, with a total of 1.121 billion people who speak this language as a primary or secondary language. The Guinness Book of World Records (1988) lists a Frenchman who was the world leader in the number of languages he spoke. This polyglot was French born Georges Henri Schmidt, a United Nations official in the middle of last century, and he was fluent in 31 languages.

A perusal of any issue of the WRTVHB clearly indicates that radio programming is on the air throughout the world in a multitude of languages, though obviously not in all of the world's total list of spoken languages. All India Radio speaks to its homeland listeners in 202 languages, and in its international shortwave services AIR speaks in 28 languages. The Voice of America, together with its subsidiary program broadcasts, speaks to the world in about 50 languages; and currently, the BBC London is on the air in its shortwave services in 18 languages.

Several of the Christian shortwave stations are also on the air in a multitude of languages. For example, Trans World Radio-TWR presents programming on shortwave in 230 languages; and Adventist World Radio-AWR speaks around 120 languages. The Far East Broadcasting Company-FEBC in the Philippines is on the air in 113 languages; and Vatican Radio presents programming in 20 languages.

With so many languages on the air from so many radio stations around the world, it is to be expected that QSL cards would also be printed in many different languages. Many shortwave stations around the globe issue QSL cards in their own national language. For example, it is rather obvious that VOA, the Voice of America, and Radio New Zealand International-RNZI issue their QSL cards, for example, in the English language. So did Radio Australia before it was abruptly closed two years ago.

Interestingly, the shortwave stations in some countries have printed their QSL cards only in English, even though their people speak other languages. For example, the QSL cards from All India Radio-AIR and Radio Bangladesh are always in English. QSL cards from Radio Canada International-RCI, when they were on the air, were always printed in both of their official languages, French and English.

Then too, the shortwave stations in many other countries also issue QSL cards in English as well as in their own national language. Germany's Deutsche Welle has printed QSL cards in German, as well as in English. Back in the mid-1990s, the German service of the BBC-London also issued their own QSL card which was printed in German. Other stations that have issued QSL cards printed in the German language have been KBS-South Korea, Radio Pyongyang-North Korea, and the Voice of Vietnam in Hanoi.

China has issued separate QSL cards in Chinese, Japanese, Portuguese and English; Radio Australia has issued QSL cards in Asian languages such as Japanese and Thai. Radio New Zealand International has also issued cards in the Japanese language. Vatican Radio has issued QSL cards in English and Latin; and Switzerland has issued QSL cards in four languages: German, French, Italian and English.

In addition to internationally-known languages on QSL cards, at least two of the artificially constructed auxiliary languages have also been presented on QSL cards. In 1957, amateur station SP8CK in Lublin, Poland made a QSO contact with station CX1AK in Montevideo, Uruguay in South America. The QSL card from Poland was printed in Esperanto, the most popular of all the constructed auxiliary languages.

A very rare language was used for the text on a QSL card in 1930. This card was issued by amateur spark station SKW in the city of Uman in the Ukraine, and it confirmed a QSO with an American amateur station, NU1BES, in Providence Rhode Island.

The holder of the callsign NU1BES was Lewis Bellem, an engineer with the Universal Winding Company that manufactured radio coils in Providence under the trade name Coto-Coils. In 1938, both Bellem and Granville Lindley, a fellow engineer from the Universal Winding Company, went out to Pitcairn Island in the South Pacific and installed the amateur radio broadcasting station VR6AY.

The text on the QSL card from amateur station SKW in the Ukraine is printed in the Ido language, which is a modified dialect descendant from the better known Esperanto language. These days there are no more than 200 people throughout the world who have learned to speak the Ido language.

Finally, in our perusal of languages on QSL cards, we come to the print language for the blind, which was named Braille in honor of its founder, Frenchman Louis Braille, who was blinded in childhood by an accident. As a fifteen year old teenager in 1824, Braille invented a system of six raised dots that enable blind people to read and understand the dots with their fingers.

In 1955, amateur radio station F9KX in France issued a QSL card to K6GW in the United States. The QSL text on this card is printed in the French language, and a French Braille message composed with raised dots is also embossed onto the card.

In 1994, Arthur Cushen at Invercargill in South New Zealand received a QSL card and letter from the ABC station 2PB in Australia's capital city, Canberra. At the time, station 2PB was on the air as an ABC news station, and the transmitter was the old 2 kW 2CY that had been rejuvenated and retuned to 1440 kHz. The QSL letter was four pages long, and it was prepared in Australian Braille.

And finally, several years ago, Adventist World Radio in Indianapolis issued a limited number of QSL cards that were printed with an English text and also with a brief message in American Braille. These cards were borrowed from the Adventist-operated Christian Record Services in Lincoln, Nebraska.