Radio’s Golden Days: When wireless started “radio fever” begun to rise

The first actual broadcast to the public-at-large was made by 2SB on Wednesday 23, 1923. The wireless had been a long-time coming. Meanwhile, the expectant populace were getting edgy. Charles Maclurcan came up with a solution.  

Maclurcan had a sixth sense when it came to radio and sophisticated programming. Other folk, who were engaged in the wireless business, had their eyes on the money that could be made from such a venture.

Among the amateur transmitters of the early 1920s, was the dapper Charles Dansie Maclurcan. The clean-cut Maclurcan was said to be the recognised doyen of Australian experimental radio.
Maclurcan was the founder of the first radio station in Australian, 2CM. “The distinguished listeners were enraptured by their first taste of radio broadcasting”, said Philip Geeves, author of The Dawn of Australia’s Radio Broadcasting.

His interest in wireless dated from about 1909. His first station was on the roof of Sydney’s Wentworth Hotel, which his family owned.

Years afterwards, Maclurcan said: “I don’t suppose I would ever have taken up wireless, only Jack Pike, another pioneer experimenter and I were both rather keen on the same girl.

“He seemed to be getting more of her attention, so I decided to make a make a noise like a spark gap in order to side-track her. I didn’t succeed, but, anyway, she married someone else”.

By the 1920s, Maclurcan’s station at Strathfield, 2CM, was the most consistent and dependable and a top performer in the Commonwealth.

In addition, Maclurcan possessed a fine program sense and his regular Sunday night concerts of recorded music were an endless source of delight; there were countless listeners in the eastern states.

Oswald Mingay, a stalwart in the radio business, believed broadcasting stations could support themselves from advertising revenue, provided the permission to advertise was granted.

 Maclurcan arranged for Miss Josie Melville, the current toast of the town, to broadcast to devoted fans from 2CM on a Sunday night in March.

She was starring in the musical Sally, then in its eleventh week, was playing to capacity houses at Her Majesty’s Theatre, Sydney.

Maclurcan had a sixth sense about radio.

Fronting up the 2CM microphone to sing, Melville was probably the first Australian artist to confess to ‘mike fright”. She was awestricken when she realised that her voice was travelling from that small piece of mechanism into hundreds of homes.

Some amateurs of the period were destined to make notable contributions to radio broadcasting and become respected figures in the industry.

There was one person in particular, Oswald Mingay. Mingay established a trade magazines company, which published a spate of radio journals for the industry just after was it born.

Prior to this, with his column in the Daily Telegraph, he would keep readers informed about any “up to the last minute” movements in radio development.

In 1923, broadcasting was a serious business and somebody was prone to ask, “who is going to pay for all of this?” 

In retrospect, Mingay’s reasoning was remarkably simple: broadcasting stations should support themselves from the advertising revenue they legitimately recouped. His scheme was accepted.

“The success of early Australian radio following the official start in 1923,” said a spokesperson, “relied heavily on listeners to the program.”

“Hello, Hello, 2FC Sydney” – this is how Stanley Cochrane, upbeat presenter on radio, primarily left his mark as the children’s friend and storyteller. He also beguiled adults with readings from his favourite author, Mr Charles Dickens.

The second issue of Wireless Weekly trumpeted that ‘wire telephony is now out of experimental stage … and it is time the authorities came to realise this”, said Geeves.

The Weekly printed advance details of Maclurcan Sunday night concerts.

“Interestingly enough, Cecil Stevenson, who later founded Sydney radio 2UE, was probably responsible for Maclurcan’s early conversion to radiotelephony”, said Geeves.

“Stevenson imported a small shipment of valves from the United States only to discover that they were transmitting valves – he passed them on to Maclurcan.

Maclurcan used the transmitting valves to build his first speech transmitter.

Philip Geeves wrote: “The Government’s belated move on broadcasting was the signal for the more advanced amateurs in each State to emulate Charles Maclurcan by converting their ‘rigs’ to telephony and transmitting recorded music”.

In May 1923, a Sydney journalist commented that “six months ago we had only 2CM transmitting music on Sunday night. Now any night in the week you can have a choice of at least three (stations) sending music in NSW”.

National radio, at last, says, “Hello Australia”.

For the dauntless pioneers, as in other countries, radio broadcasting was largely the outcome of experiments by dedicated men who had persuaded the Federal Government to license Australia’s first public broadcasting station.

When Dame Nellie Melba’s name was mentioned, that she was going to do her farewell opera performance, one contemporary said that you could not buy, hire or borrow a radio set in Melbourne.

“Despite the enthusiasm and activities of the pioneers, to the great mass of Australian wireless listeners in the 1920s, they thought it was hardly more than a voguish novelty that would inevitably go the way of all technical fads”, said Philip Geeves.

Many stations had big plans for their opening night.

On January 10, 1924, Philip Greeves said that 2FC offered the public an “inaugural programme, being a complete performance” of the current musical, A Southern Maid, starring Gladys Moncrieff from Her Majesty’s Theatre.

Geeves writes, “in with a matter of weeks, 2FC would follow this with The Merry Widow and Sybil performed by the Royal Comic Opera Company”.

Said Geeves: “The theatrical influence manifested itself in 3LO’s spectacular opening program on October 13, 1924”.

Officials announced that “Dame Nellie Melba’s farewell performance of the opera, La Boheme, from the stage of the His Majesty’s Theatre”.

“One contemporary recalled that it was impossible to buy, hire or borrow a radio set in Melbourne”, said Geeves.

Farmer’s 2FC had some grandiose program plans..

These were “arrangements with J.C. Williamson and J.N. Tait for transmission of entertainment items from their circuits, a morning news service from The Sydney Morning Herald to be supplemented by an evening service from the Evening News.

There were, in addition, quotations from the Sydney Stock Exchange.

By the mid-1920s, the populous eastern states radio stations enjoyed a “virtual monopoly” of the best talent. Jack Lumsdaine was one person who had found fame in leaps and bounds. His song Calling was voted the most popular in a 1927 competition.

Lumsdaine went on the become one of the most durable performers on Australian radio.  

The country’s first “turf commissioner” was 2FC’s Mick Ferry, who set a pattern that was copied by stations Australia wide.

By September 1926, Ferry had described 53 races, a service which a sporting columnist called “the greatest consolation of modern times”.

The columnist continues: “At any point in the race punters can make another little wager, if so inclined. As the field flashes past the judge’s box, the keen eye of the expert announces the places.”

It wasn’t long before Station 3AR set-up another coup. They invited Walter Lindrum to broadcast lessons on billiards. He did.

A spokeswomen said, “Nell Stirling gave many young actors their first start, and helped pave the way for women into radio production”.

Hello world!, More, and more  women are cracking the airwaves with eyes on a new-found career. The early days of the 1930s saw women starting a new and different type of radio work – one that needed a woman’s touch.

It didn’t long for the ‘serials’ to take hold in the boom years of 1930s. Nell Stirling, an actor and ‘behind-the-screen’ executive, was queen of the radio serials. Stirling, born in Sydney, starred in small parts and grew to be a star of the entertainment industry.

She favoured the thrillers and romantic series, and created “too many to count”, and played the lead in many.

Stirling did the casting, editing the scripts, chose the music and produced the plays. She turned her hand to anything as long as the script was finished on time.

A spokeswoman said: “Nell Stirling gave young actors their start and helped pave the way for women into radio production”.

In 1933, Dorothy Jordon became the first radio women announcer in Australia. Jordon told Housewife magazine: “I didn’t know how it would go. But it turned out trumps”.

Her recipe for success was simple: a clear, unaffected voice and an immense amount of general knowledge.

Actor, journalist and novelist Mary Marlowe, who had her own session in Sydney on 2UE, was the first to introduce formal interviews to the radio format. That was in 1934.

Marlowe, who for many years had leading roles on the world’s stage in comedy, drama, Shakespeare and vaudeville, reported Woman magazine, “was an old hand at radio and her charming personality always ensures being host to a wide audience”.

Other “personalities” to join the throng of radio, according to Geeves, included Grace Shaw, May Filmer, Dorothea Vautier, Gwen Gibson, Myra Dempsey and Linda Littlejohn.

They filled the role of breakfast announcers, art and book, women’s mornings and homecraft, and foreign affairs.

>> Background from The Dawn of Australian Radio Broadcasting, Philip Jeeves, Federal Publishing Company, 1993; Frank Morris.

Top: Early radio! The heyday of the communication era is under way. Below: Mick Ferry, Australia’s first racing commentator, who established a pattern for the broadcasting industry.