WAVE LENGTH OF ROYAL WEDDING BROADCAST

Evening Star, Issue 21904, 15 December 1934, Page 4

WAVE LENGTH OF ROYAL WEDDING BROADCAST

Those behind the scenes of broadcasting unite in paying a tribute to the "Victorian manager of the Australian Broadcasting Commission (Mr T. W. Bearup) for his persistent efforts to induce the British Broadcasting Corporation not to alter its wave length* fertile short wave transmission of the Royal wedding ceremony and descriptions. Had Mr Bearup not been successful in this respect, it is considered highly improbable that the broadcast would have reached these parts in a form suitable for relaying to local listeners When the 8.8. C. announced that it intended to 'transmit the Royal wedding broadcast through the Empire station GSD (25.53 metres), Mr Bearup, through his long experience of short-wave broadcasting, immediately recognised that though this wave length might, as the 8.8. C. experts contended, effect an “ optimum Empire coverage,” it was at the same time most unsuitable for Australian conditions at this time of the year, and at that hour of the evening. He continued these protests until as late as 6.45 p.m. E.S.T. on the day of the wedding, when British broadcasting authorities at last announced that they would revert to GSF (19.82 metres) , the wave length most suitable for this zone. As a result the broadcast came through in first-class quality.