Abstract
This chapter takes a step back from the 1920s, to the invention of radio as a communications technology. It pays particular attention to the First World War and its contribution to making the explosion of radio in the 1920s possible. It argues that the War not only spread technical knowledge, but also set parameters for subsequent implementation of radio as a cultural medium, leaving a long and broad legacy for the beginnings of the radio hobby. This was true everywhere, but in Germany, with the trauma of losing the War, its legacy took a very particular form.
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Notes
- 1.
The most recent, and definitive work on Marconi is: Marc Raboy, Marconi: the Man Who Networked the World (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2014).
- 2.
See Raboy, Marconi, Chapter 2. See also: G.R.M. Garratt, The Early History of Radio, From Faraday to Marconi (IET History of Technology Series 20) (London: the Institution of Engineering and Technology, 1994, 2006).
- 3.
Note that after France, Prussia was one of the first major states to build lengthy semaphore telegraph lines.
- 4.
Independently of Morse, William Fothergill Cooke and Charles Wheatstone patented their own telegraph system in the same year in England, but it was much more cumbersome than Morse’s. There were also a number of experimental wired telegraph systems before Morse and Cooke and Wheatstone. See: Tom Standage, The Victorian Internet: The Remarkable Story of the Telegraph and the Nineteenth Century’s On-line Pioneers (New York: Bloomsbury, 2014). See also: Ken. Beauchamp, History of Telegraphy, Its Technology and Application (IET History of Technology Series 26) (London: the Institution of Engineering and Technology, 1994, 2006).
- 5.
Michael Friedewald, Die “Tönenden Funken”. Geschichte eines frühen drahtlosen Kommunikationssystems, 1905–1914, Aachener Beitrage zur Wissenschafts-und Technikgeschichte des 20. Jahrhunderts 2 (Berlin: Diepholz/GNT Verlag, 1999); James W. Carey, “Technology and Ideology: The Case of the Telegraph”, Prospects 8 (1983): 303–25 and Heidi J.S. Evans (Tworek), “ ‘The Path to Freedom’? Transocean and Wireless Telegraphy, 1914–1922”, Historical Social Research 35, No. 1 (2010); 209–236.
- 6.
Edgar Reiz, “Heimat-eine Deutsche Chronik”, Edgar Reitz Film (ERF), Sender Freies Berlin (SFB) and Westdeutscher Rundfunk (WDR) (1984).
The passage in question is roughly at the 57″ to 1:02″ mark in the first episode of the film, appropriately titled “Fernweh” (“Wanderlust”).
- 7.
The radio shown in the film is an anachronism, since it uses radio design/technology characteristic of 1927 or 1928, rather than 1923 when the scene takes place.
- 8.
This is a famous postwar song, published in 1918 and written by Joe Young and Sam M. Lewis with music by Walter Donaldson. http://libx.bsu.edu/cdm/ref/collection/ShtMus/id/725
- 9.
This could easily be the topic of a separate study. As “signposts”, let me simply again mention the film “King Kong” (Merian C. Cooper, RKO Radio Pictures, 1933), or bring up other examples such as the novel “Murder on the Orient Express” (Agatha Christie, Glasgow: William Collins & Sons, 1934), the 1922 discovery of the tomb of Tutankhamen and following Egyptian craze or the Antarctic of Richard Byrd (1928–1930), with its direct radio broadcasts. See the following chapter.
- 10.
As examples of a much larger debate, see: Wiebe E. Bijker, Thomas P. Hughes and Trevor Pinch (eds.), The Social Construction of Technological Systems: New Directions in the Sociology and History of Technology. Anniversary Edition (Cambridge, Massachusetts and London: MIT University Press, 2012); for a more recent example, see: Jannis Kallinikos, Hans Hasselbladh, Attila Marton, “Governing social practice: Technology and institutional change”, Theory and Society 42, No. 4 (July 2013): 395–421.
- 11.
See: David Hochfelder, The Telegraph in America, 1832–1920 Johns Hopkins Studies in the History of Technology (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2012).
- 12.
Telegraph played a major role in the wars of German unification, including the Austro-Prussian and Franco-Prussian wars, but this involved, for the most part, civilian telegraph networks. The Prussian/German armed forces were comparatively slow to build their own military field networks and devise doctrine for their use until the early 1900s. Werner Niehaus, Die Nachrichtentruppe, 1914 bis heute. Entstehung und Einsatz (Stuttgart: Motorbuch Verlag, 1980): 12–19. See, in general, Hans Georg Kampe, Nachrichtentruppe des Heeres und Deutsche Reichspost. Militärisches und staatliches Nachrichtenwesen in Deutschland, 1830 bis 1945 (Wandesruh bei Berlin: Project Verlag Dr. Erwin Meißler, 1999).
- 13.
Actually, one should say German “armies”, since prior to 1919, the land forces of the German Army were made up of the separate armies from the Kingdoms of Prussia, Saxony, Bavaria, and Württemberg, though with far-reaching coordination in doctrine, training, and equipment. For a basic introduction, see: Gordon R. Craig, The Politics of the Prussian Army (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1956) or Rudolf Absolon, Die Wehrmacht im Dritten Reich, Vol. I: 30. January 1933 bis 2. August 1934 (Boppard am Rhein: Harald Boldt Verlag, 1969): 1–15.
- 14.
Kampe, Nachrichtentruppe; Niehaus: Nachrichtentruppe.
- 15.
Niehaus: Nachrichtentruppe. Of course, German problems with the employment of modern communications were relative; Germany’s enemies were often no better, and sometimes, as in the case of Russia, much worse. In particular, Russian use of clear-text rather than encrypted radio transmissions to send orders to the field armies played a major role in initial German successes in the battles of Tannenberg and the Masurian Lakes.
- 16.
For a good introduction to the increased importance of modern communications media during the war, including radio, see the recent exhibition in the German Communications Museum, Berlin. Thomas Jander and Veit Didczuneit, Netze des Krieges. Kommunikation 1914–1918 (Museumsstiftung für Post und Telekommunikation/Brandenburgisches Verlagshaus, 2014).
- 17.
See Alexander Rabinowitch, The Bolsheviks in Power: The First Year of Soviet Rule in Petrograd (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2007): 164–165. Note that the Bolsheviks used radio to contact the Germans only because they had no other reliable means with which to do so; land telegraphy via Finland would theoretically have been possible, but the Bolsheviks had no guarantee that the often highly politicized telegraphers along the way would forward the message.
- 18.
For example, see the advertisement for radio material out of “army stock” (Heeresbestände) from the “Chrlottenburger Motorengesellschaft” Radio, No. 4 (July 25, 1923): 150 or the advertisement of the company Dürre & Bierstedt in Magdeburg. In: Der Radio-Amateur 2, No. 25 (October 10, 1924): 668 or: “Verwendung alter Heereskopfhörer” von Dr. G. Heußel, in: Der Radio-Amateur 4, No. 11 (March 12, 1926): 219–220.
See also: Curt Urban, “Der Erzieherische Wert des Radioamateurwesens”, Der Radio-Amateur 1, No. 2 (September 1923): 33–35, which mentions the accessibility of surplus military equipment as an aid to would-be do-it-yourselfers.
- 19.
As someone who grew up with a deep fascination for the local army surplus store in the 1960s, this author would welcome a study of the social consequences of so much surplus material being available after the two world wars.
- 20.
The vacuum tube was first invented by Fleming in 1904, then (separately) made useful by von Lieben (1906) and DeForest (1907). It was used first as an amplifier in civilian wired telegraphy and telephony, particularly to amplify signals in very long lines. In this capacity, radio tubes were used in large numbers during the war. Only after their widespread use in wired telegraphy and telephony did the usefulness of vacuum tubes in radio receivers and transmitters become clear. See: H.J. Van Der Bijl, The Thermionic Vacuum Tube and its Applications (New York: McGraw Hill, 1920): xvii–xix. On the history of vacuum tubes, see: Massimo Guarnieri, “The Age of Vacuum Tubes: Early Devices and the Rise of Radio Communications [Historical]”, IEEE Industrial Electronics Magazine 6, No. 1 (March 2012): 40–43.
- 21.
See: Hartmut Petzold, “Zur Entstehung der elektronischen Technologie in Deutschland und den USA. Der Beginn der Massenproduktion von Elektronenröhren 1912–1918”, Geschichte und Gesellschaft 13, No. 3 Sozialgeschichte der Technik (1987): 340–367.
- 22.
See: Dr. Eugen Nesper, “Nachste Ziele der Radiotechnik”, Der Radio-Amateur 3, No. 35 (August 28, 1926): 856–857. “Low-loss” in this context means having low resistance and, therefore, low power loss in a circuit.
- 23.
Niehaus, Nachrichtentruppe, 24–25. It is not clear if this figure is only for the Prussian Army, or for the entire land forces of the German Empire (therefore, the Prussian, Saxon, Bavarian, and Württemberg armies combined.)
- 24.
Niehaus: Nachrichtentruppe, 21–24.
- 25.
See Kampe for a more detailed discussion of this organization.
- 26.
This is a very rough estimate.
- 27.
Absolon, Vol. I, 4.
- 28.
All estimates here are highly conservative. The estimate is based on the following calculation:
A. Army:
-
1.
Army officers and enlisted men in the “Nachrichtentrupppen” (formerly “Telegraphentruppen”) in 1918: 4, 381 officers and 185,000 men.
-
2.
Communications troops organic to infantry divisions, roughly 1300 per division:
-
(a)
200 with divisional staff
-
(b)
130–150 communications troops per infantry regiment (@ two per division)
-
(c)
17 in each battalion (@ three infantry battalions per regiment)
-
(d)
Field Artillery Regiment: assume similar number to Infantry regiment = 200 (one FA Regiment per division)
-
(a)
Total number of Infantry Divisions in German Army in 1918: 247
(247 × 1300 = 321,100 communications troops organic to infantry divisions)
In addition, there were 2250 independent Foot Artillery Batteries
(assume same number as battery of Field Artillery = 22 or 49,500 communications troops)
A total of 251 radio stations existed with airfields and aircraft units.
(assume 15 men ea. = 3765)
B. Navy:
520 ships (not counting East Asian gunboats, obsolete coastal defense ships or vessels too small to carry radios).
Assume at least ten men on average per ship trained in radio. = 5200 men
Further radio personnel with the:
Marinestation der Ostsee, Marinestation Kiel, Marinestation Friedrichsort, Marinestation der Nordsee, Marinestation Wilhelmshaven, Marinestation Geestemünde, Marinestation Helgoland, Marinestation Cuxhaven, Six Marinestationen in German colonies:
assume at least 12 radio personnel per Marinestation = 144
Reichsmarineamt
Admiralstab der Marine (responsible for communications equipment)
assume at least ten each = 20
Marinetelegraphenschule Lehe
assume 50 men
(does not include radio personnel with navy division in Flanders or naval aircraft units)
Deutsche Militärgeschichte 1648–1939 (Munich: Bernard & Graefe 1983), Bd. 5, Abschnitt VIII Deutsche Marinegeschichte der Neuzeit, 263–273; 295; 308–310.
= roughly 5214 men trained in radio with German Navy (real numbers surely higher; estimate does not include attrition).
Lower estimates may be found in the literature. See: Helmut Schanze: “Rundfunk, Medium und Masse. Voraussetzungen und Folge der Medialisierung nach dem 1. Weltkrieg”, Die Idee des Radios von den Anfängen in Europa und den USA bis 1933. Jahrbuch Medien und Geschichte 2004 (Konstanz: UVK Verlagsgesellschaft, 2004): 18ff, Schanze gives an estimate of 100,000 men trained as military radio operators, a figure surely too high for those trained specifically as radio operators, but plausible if it includes wired telegraphers.
-
1.
- 29.
Even if the introduction of broadcast radio in 1923 meant that most people would listen to voice transmissions with their radios, Morse code was still highly important for identifying stations over the air and was a basic tool of ham radio. Articles abound in the radio hobby press well into the late 1920s urging radio listeners to learn Morse code.
- 30.
For example, when, at the beginning of broadcast radio in Germany, an “Audionversuchserlaubnis” was required to own and use a radio receiver, special advanced, accelerated classes were offered, which were limited to former military radio men. See: “Mitteilungen”, Der Radio-Amateur 2, No. 26 (October 17, 1924): 691–694.
- 31.
The social forms for the employment of any given technology are, of course, quite a separate thing from the basic science behind it. Physics is one thing, but form is social. See, for example, Bijker, Hughes, and Pinch Social Construction.
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Campbell, B.B. (2019). German Radio Before Broadcasting: Scientists, War, and Imperialism. In: The Radio Hobby, Private Associations, and the Challenge of Modernity in Germany. Palgrave Studies in the History of Science and Technology. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-26534-2_3
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