The history and importance of broadcasting-The Broadcasting Museum in Hawarden

Broadcasting Museum in Hawarden

Broadcasting was one of the most significant factors in the development of 20th century culture. For the first time, one person could address a nation simultaneously in their own homes. News, music and entertainment could be made available to all who wanted it. A single teacher could teach a million people, a single musician could play before an audience that would have been undreamed of in the previous century.

The technology of radio and television has changed enormously over a relatively short time, and artefacts from even the recent past have become outdated so fast that they have all but disappeared. The Broadcasting Museum was set up in 1994 to tell the story of these once-familiar objects in the context of the rapidly changing twentieth century. It was a private collection, and the museum, which was part of On The Air, relied solely on admission charges. It attracted a lot of acclaim, and was seen by thousands of visitors from all over the world.

However, due to the expiry of the lease on the premises in Chester, the Museum closed at the end of September 2000. The collection was not dispersed, as it was bought by the BBC - hopefully to form the nucleus of a national exhibition of British Broadcasting, although to date this has not yet happened.

Although the original setting of the Museum of Broadcasting is no longer avaliable to see, there is a virtual tour for those who are interested on the museum's website.

Wireless

As you entered the Museum, the displays started with the beginning of radio, or wire-less telegraphy, as it was first called. Before wireless, the only means of long range communication was the telephone, and you could use a telephone exchange of the type in use from the 1920s to listen to Guiglielmo Marconi explain how he came to Britain in the 1890s to further his experiments.

Marconi's discoveries led to the use of wireless as a means of Morse code communication with shipping, and later on it was discovered that voice and even music could be sent. The possibilities of this as a public service were realised by the main manufacturers of wireless equipment, who set up the British Broadcasting Company in 1922.

Examples of wireless sets from the 1920s are shown in the display case. At first, wireless was more of a hobby than an entertainment or information medium.

1920's radios from the archives

The simplest receiver was a crystal set, which used a mineral crystal (usually Galena) as a rectifier, and enabled the listener to tune in the station on headphones, assuming they were within range of a station, had a 100 foot long aerial, and could locate a sensitive part of the crystal using a wire probe called a "cat's whisker".

To obtain greater range or volume, a valve receiver was needed. This was much more expensive - a valve could cost a week's wages and was easily damaged. Valve radios required electricity from batteries, a large High Tension battery giving about 120 volts, and a Low Tension accumulator, which could be recharged like a modern mobile phone or laptop battery. The difference was, it weighed several pounds and could spill corrosive acid. Most radio owners had two, one to use and one being charged. Cycle shops and garages, as well as wireless dealers would recharge accumulators for about 6d.

One person could listen on headphones, but for a family to 'listen in' a loud-speaker was needed. These at first were metal or wooden horns fixed to a telephone receiver. Visitors could compare the sound of an early Horn speaker with the later Moving Iron cone speaker, and the Moving Coil type, which appeared just before 1930. This is the type we still use today.

Many enthusiasts built their own sets. There were examples of these in the Museum, and of the components that could be bought for home construction.

Radio became the latest craze, and was the subject of numerous magazines, postcards, and even puzzles. Examples of these, and the range of parts available for home construction were on display in this area.

Through the window you could see into a 1920s living room, with a young lady trying to hear the latest dance music on the new wireless set, complete with batteries, accumulator and a huge frame aerial.

Interactive exhibits

To learn about how radio actually works, and see how your voice is turned into a radio signal, there was a display where you could find out for yourself.

Visitors could speak into the microphone and see their voice turned into an electrical signal, shown on an oscilloscope. The display then showed the same signal as it is modulated on the carrier wave, the high-frequency radio signal that carries the sound (lower) frequencies through the air from the transmitter to the receiver.

On pressing a button, the signal is demodulated, cutting off the carrier and restoring the sound signal. This is what happens in an Amplitude Modulated (A.M.) type of radio set.

The North Regional BBC Transmitter

Also in this area were some parts from one of the first BBC regional transmitters, Moorside Edge, which broadcast the North Regional programme from the high moors near Huddersfield. It was opened in 1931, and the transmitter building was an impressive piece of industrial architecture.

The huge copper coil and the meters mounted on a slate panel were part of the state of the art high power transmitter, shown in a contemporary Exide battery advertisement above the exhibit. The transmitter was built by the Marconi company, and opened in 1931. It was only taken out of service in the 1980s.

The Exide batteries advert came from a radio shop in Newport, South Wales. It had been on the wall in the workshop for at least 60 years.

The shop, Lloyd & Lloyd, was typical of many that diversified into wireless in the 1920s. It was an ironmongers shop, that sold everything from paraffin to agricultural implements, but when the proprietor became interested in wireless, he began to sell sets and parts. They then began to build their own sets for sale, examples of which have been seen.

Later on, they became agents for major manufacturers. The son of the founder said that he remembered his father setting up a horn loudspeaker outside the shop so that passers-by could hear the latest news of the General Strike in 1926. The carbon filament bulb in the Wartime area of the museum was from the unsold stock in the shop, and is at least 50 years old. It was working every day for several years, and already outlasted many modern bulbs.

The Golden Age of radio

By 1930 the wireless set was no longer an experimental apparatus, nor the enthusiast's toy. It was a practical means of home entertainment, providing news, music and education.

It moved from the 'Wireless Den' into the living room or parlour, and had now to look like a piece of furniture. Manufacturers wanted their sets to appear simple to operate, so out went complicated panels cluttered with knobs and switches, while in came the new motifs of the Jazz Age - Art Deco inspired geometric shapes, fretwork inspired by leaves or sunsets, and new, innovative shapes that had their origins in the Art Schools of Europe.

Wireless cabinets had to appeal for the first time to the lady of the house, who often had the decisive vote in the choice of set. Manufacturers realised that the appearance of the set was every bit as important in making a sale as the technical prowess. The more affordable sets were becoming more and more standardised technically anyway.

One of the most aesthetically different designs for a radio cabinet was produced for Ekco Radio Ltd by architect and designer Wells Coates, who amongst other projects designed part of BBC Broadcasting House, which opened in 1932. This radio set was of a circular shape, and unlike any other cabinet produced at that time. It was moulded in a new material, Bakelite, which was cheaper than the veneered wood used for most cabinets. Ekco had pioneered the use of this material in Britain since 1930, but the circular model AD65 is now considered a classic, as it was the first Bakelite cabinet to exploit the moulding potential of the material, rather than imitating wood.

Many other manufacturers produced interesting and unusual designs, as demand increased and almost every household aspired to own a wireless set. Most people could still not afford to buy a set outright, but instead opted to buy on Hire Purchase. Retailers and manufacturers offered their own schemes, but as prices fell throughout the 1930s, competition was strong.

One of the cheapest sets on offer was the Philco "People's Set", available from 6 Guineas (£6.6s). This was a British made set by an American manufacturer, available in various forms to suit the different range of mains electricity across the country. Some areas had AC, some DC, and at voltages from 200 to 250. Many rural areas had no electricity, so the battery model was still a popular choice.

1930's radios from the archives

Wireless was the boom industry of the 1930s, and every town had shops selling and repairing wireless sets. Some were extensions of existing businesses, often cycle shops or even ironmongers. The site of the Museum was such a shop - originally Horswill's Cycles, it later specialised in wireless. This photograph was taken around 1930, and the business still existed in Northgate Street, Chester, at the time the Museum was open. When the Museum was being set up, we did not know the history of the shop, so we invented our own shop, 'Nixon's', taken from an old illuminated sign that was used outside the window. All the signs, posters and items used inside the shop are original, but the fabric of the shop is of course fake, done by the scenic artists who created the studio sets for many well known programmes, including 'Coronation Street'.The BBC was the only organisation allowed to broadcast in Britain. They were forbidden from carrying any form of advertising, but some businesses wanted commercial radio to be available. Radio stations were set up in France and Luxembourg with their transmissions beamed into Britain, and they broadcast on a Sunday, when light music was not broadcast by the BBC.This advertisement display is for the Horlicks radio shows on Radio Luxembourg and Radio Normandie, where popular dance bands like Debroy Somers played to an audience based mainly in the South of England.