An interesting fact about the Radio London Christmas Broadcast
1997/1998 was that there wasn't meant to be one!!!
A meeting had already taken place at East Anglian Productions' headquarters
in Frinton during November and, so I understand from some who attended the meeting,
the general consensus of opinion was that it wasn't a good idea to have another
broadcast due to lack of preparation time, and people's other commitments over
the Christmas period, etc. Being a regular caller to the JayBee Newsline, I
had already heard John Burch announce that there was not to be a second Big
L RSL during 1997 after all.
However, the next thing I heard was that, with the agreement of the Radio Authority
there was, after all, to be a broadcast coming from London with an allocation
on 1503 kHz. This was all very sudden and a complete turn-around from what had
previously been announced. As far as I was concerned this was really excellent
news; there hadn't been a Big L broadcast for 30 years and then there were to
be two within a couple of months of each other. Fantastic news!!!!
During the summer of 1997 I had been able to hear the Radio London transmissions
very well indeed at my home near Southend in Essex. However, knowing that the
station was now to be situated in St. Katherine's Dock in London by the side
of Tower Bridge, I was now concerned that I might not be able to hear the signal
at my home location. During Frinton 1997 I had constructed a frame aerial which
I found made the already good reception of the signal even better; would this
piece of equipment be as successful in helping me to hear the transmissions
from the Ocean Defender? Time would tell.
On the night before the commencement of the licence, being the anorak that I
am, I set off for London along the well-trodden A13 being determined to hear
the rebirth of the station clearly and not risking not being able to hear the
signal at home. I had reached the Royal Albert Dock by about ten minutes to
midnight and, on finding a suitable place to park, I tuned my car radio to 1503
kHz and waited.
At the appointed hour my efforts were well rewarded with the sound of "Big Lil"
and I knew that the station had, for the second time in a year, successfully
come on air. My location was only a few miles downriver from St. Katherine's
Dock and the signal was very strong; if only the signal could be still heard
at home!
I remained at my location by the dock for about one and a half hours, during
which time I took the trouble to phone the ship with a reception report. Wonderful
Radio London was being wonderful once again! I did explore the local area by
driving around but didn't on this occasion actually venture as far as the ship.
Being the month of December it was too cold to keep the car in one place for
too long; I had to keep some warmth in the heater. Didn't have this problem
down in Frinton during the summer!
Hearing the voices of Ray Anderson and Chris Elliot once more brought back all
the very happy memories which I had from the Frinton broadcast. The setting
was different but it was still the same station with the same people. Truly
wonderful!
I decided that I had better see about heading for home since I had to go to
work later in the day. Ray decided to put on the Wonderful Radio London Story
triple CD to provide overnight programming and, since I already have this material
in my collection, I decided that this was the time to depart. I headed back
to the A13, still listening, of course, but unfortunately the signal strength
dropped considerably without my having travelled very far at all.
It is very difficult to listen successfully to weak stations on the medium waveband
during the hours of darkness due mainly to the "skip effect". [This is when
distant stations interfere with local transmissions. Ed.] It would, therefore,
be impossible to know for sure until the following morning whether listening
to Radio London at home would be possible or not. I would have to wait and see.
The following morning I did try to listen but there was barely any signal there
at all. I tried using the frame aerial which had performed so well during the
summer broadcast but things weren't much better. Oh dear, how very disappointing.
I did find that by driving to a higher location, particularly by the Thames
Estuary, the signal strength did improve considerably. The Chalkwell Park area
was particularly good but I couldn't stay there all day. Even then the strong
continental stations started breaking through at about 2.45 p.m.; it gets dark
very early at this time of year. What a pity it was that I couldn't move my
house into the park!
The fact that I could not hear the signal at home, in the main, accounted for
my making several visits to London during the 28 day broadcast, the first of
which was on Christmas Eve 1997. I was very pleased to be able to meet both
Ray and Chris once again and, since things were visitor-wise very quiet that
afternoon, we were able to have a good chat and catch up on a number of happenings
which had occurred since the end of the Frinton broadcast earlier in the year.
I was taken on a tour of the ship which included the engine room and also the
facilities of the Earthkind organisation who had very kindly provided their
ship, the Ocean Defender, for the duration of the broadcast.
Later in the afternoon, since at the time nobody else was around, I had the
opportunity to answer the phone a couple of times; one of the calls happened
to be from a certain John Ross-Barnard who, so I understand, had previously
been approached by Ray with a view to helping out with the news items during
the broadcast! I had the pleasure of meeting John in person for the first time
during one of my later visits to the ship.
It was a sad fact of life that, during the Christmas holiday period, the station
were desperately short of broadcasting staff. So acute was this problem that,
at one time, Big L was being referred to (rather unfairly, in my own opinion)
as "Radio Ray Anderson", since whenever one tuned in during this period the
only person who was ever apparently heard on-air was Ray, usually with Chris
Elliot reading the news, with perhaps a swap over of job functions throughout
the day. It does have to be said that, particularly during this period, Chris
and Ray certainly did carry out the lion's share of all the various tasks, broadcasting
included, and I take my hat off to both of them for this very reason. They worked
unbelievably hard with the determination to make the broadcast a success.
During the 28 day RSL I made several visits to the ship, usually at weekends,
and had the pleasure of meeting many Radio London supporters, some of whom I
had also met the previous summer down in Frinton. Some of the names I can recall
were Dr. John and Brian who I had a very long talk with while they were being
served by Pauline and Jenni in the RL shop, Geoff Rogers of Susy Radio fame
who was very kindly putting the broadcast on to the Internet in Real Audio,
and Peter Herring who took so many wonderful photographs. As I have said already,
there really were many, many more than these, so I can only apologise to those
who I met whose names have escaped me. I haven't included the crew and those
who I considered to be crew because that would just become a very unmanageable
list of names, many of whom are mentioned elsewhere on this website, anyway.
Of course, I had spent many happy days down in Frinton during the previous summer
but I shall have to tell that story at some future date.