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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 N624, February 7, 2021
German Radio Celebrates 100 Years
It was on December 22 just last year (2020), that Germany celebrated its centenary of radio broadcasting with special radio programming to honor the occasion. Just 100 years ago, on Monday, December 22, 1920, Dr. Hans Bredow and his fellow staff personnel at the Koenigswusterhausen Radio Station presented a special program of music and talks to honor the Christmas occasion. This historic radio event in Germany occurred just seven weeks after the famous first broadcast from mediumwave KDKA (8ZZ) in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in the United States.
The small town known as Koenigswusterhausen is located in the German Mark (state) of Brandenburg, and it is just a dozen miles southeast from Berlin. The German spelling for the name of this town can be transliterated into English several different ways, and it can also be shown as one word or two words. In medieval times, Koenigswusterhausen was featured as a royal city, complete with an ornate castle.
That original historic 1920 radio program in Germany began around 2 pm on December 22 with an opening announcement identifying Koenigswusterhausen, and the first piece of music, as would be expected, was "Silent Night, Holy Night," in German, "Stille Nacht, Heilige Nacht." Several staff members of the radio station presented instrumental and vocal music as their contribution to this original, though quite short, radio program.
The live broadcast was presented from a temporary indoor studio in the building that was subsequently identified as Senderhaus Nr. 1. The studio was soundproofed for the occasion with army blankets, and the only available microphone was the mouthpiece of a telephone.
At the time there were four Morse Code army-operated wireless transmitters in use at Koenigswusterhausen, and Senior Technician Erich Schwarzkopf modified one of those units for the occasion. Schwarzkopf was himself also a talented violinist.
The transmitter was a 5 kW spark unit, and it radiated the spontaneous programming of live and recorded music on longwave 2400 m. (125 kHz). The twin antenna towers stood at 330 feet high.
At the time, the general population in Germany were forbidden to own a radio receiver, so very few people heard this original first radio broadcast one hundred years ago. The only receivers permitted back then were installed in official government buildings, newspaper offices, and banks, though it is admitted that some privately-held receivers were in operation. It is suggested that the entire audience of official listeners in Germany who tuned in to this historic radio broadcast numbered around just seventy, though with a few clandestine listeners the total may have been just a little higher.
However, many listeners in other countries in Europe, as well as radio officers on ships at sea, heard this first radio broadcast from Germany. Radio monitors in Luxembourg, Holland, England and Scandinavia, as well as elsewhere, heard the broadcast, and they responded with letters of appreciation.
This 1920 Christmas broadcast was not the first occasion in which Dr. Hans Bredow presented a radio transmission. The BBC in London noted an earlier series of experimental radio broadcasts that were made from the western war front in continental Europe. Back in May 1917, Bredow transmitted music and speech for the benefit of German troops with the use of army radio equipment.
In honor of the centenary of radio broadcasting in Germany, a local organization known as the Friends of Koenigswusterhausen planned a whole series of commemorative events. The special centenary broadcast last year was planned as part of the Brandenburg (State) Festival, and it was scheduled to begin at 2:00 pm on Tuesday, December 22, 2020, exactly 100 years precisely to the minute.
The original planning indicated that the memorial broadcast last December would be heard widely on 810 kHz mediumwave, as well as on FM 93.9 and 105.1 MHz, and on shortwave 5960 kHz from Nauen. However, due to the Virus pandemic, these elaborate plans were considerably modified.
Dr. Hans Bredow officially retired in 1939, though in May 1945 he was appointed as the district president in Wiesbaden. Throughout his life time, he served in the development of radio, and he is honored to this day in Germany as the father of radio broadcasting in their country.
More about the radio scene at Koenigswusterhausen on a coming occasion.