The History of Radio In Donegal, Legal, Pirate, Festival and Local.

 

Radio in Donegal has had a colourful and diverse past. Like many counties across Ireland and especially in the 1970’s, town and villages organised festivals to attract visitors and improve local footfall to businesses. Of course, one of the most famous festivals is the annual Mary From Dungloe but as the world moved on a pace a new medium was used to promote these festivals, radio.

In the early seventies newspapers in Donegal were promoting Radio Ramelton, Radio Ballyshannon and Radio Letterkenny, which operated for the popular Letterkenny Folk Festival but while these activities had all the hallmarks of radio, they did not broadcast by traditional transmitter and aerial but were rather carried throughout their towns on a wired public address system.

In 1976 a new innovation led to an explosion of traditional analogue radio in Donegal thanks to the State broadcaster RTE. For that years ‘Mary from Dungloe’ festival RTE’s mobile radio station visited the town and broadcast as Community Radio Dungloe for the duration of the festival on 202m medium wave. The broadcasts were seen as a massive success but for RTE they were travelling around the country and could not commit to return annually to Dungloe. They did however visit other festivals in Donegal over the following years including Glenties, in Letterkenny and Ardara.

In 1981, RTE’s mobile service was advertised to return to Dungloe but just days before the festival launch, RTE said they would be unable to attend. This opened up the opportunity for a new form of broadcaster, the pirate station, to fill the void left by RTE. Radio Donegal had been operating from Letterkenny since April 1980. Using a standby transmitter, Radio Donegal headed to Dungloe and broadcast for the duration of the festival on 257m Medium wave.

 

Pirate radio by 1980 was booming across the country in every city, town and village. Donegal was no exception. While Radio Donegal in 1980 were announced as the first Donegal pirate, there had been a station on air towards the end of the second World War. Known as Radio Nuala, the station was located above the Beehive pub in Ardara. The operator broadcast propaganda on medium wave of a Republican nature aimed at a cross border audience.

Once Radio Donegal began the trend of illegal broadcasting, demonstrating both a need and as a revenue creator for the station operators, more pirates came on the air. This golden era of illegal broadcasting in Ireland lasted from 1978-1988 when new legislation with severely increased penalties for illegal broadcasting and a new legal framework for independent commercial and community radio came into being. Some of the stations heard on the airwaves in Donegal were,

Radio Donegal - 186mMW

A Letterkenny based station that initially opened in 1979 as Radio North-West. Radio Donegal was officially launched on Wednesday April 22nd 1980. The station stayed on air until September 1981 when transmitter issues and the loss of their audience to another Letterkenny pirate forced its closure.

 

Donegal Community Radio - 212mMW

Based in Mountcharles, this short lived station broadcast from June 1980 until early 1981. The station was set up by the local ‘radio committee’ who had successfully brought the RTE mobile station to the area in 1978 but when RTE stated that they could not visit again due to a packed schedule, they decided to set up a pirate operation.

 

Donegal Community Radio - 323mMW & 97.9mhzFM

This second incarnation of DCR was based in a room above the old ‘Funland’ building in Letterkenny. DCR opened in 1986 and closed in December 1988 when new legislation was enacted. The station was started by Paddy Simpson with Bobby McDaid later taking over the running of DCR. ^[1]

Glencoagh Radio - 262mMW & 97.8mhzFM

Originally called Westside Radio in 1987 and broadcasting initially on 266m, the station’s name clashed with a nearby station broadcasting in County Sligo. The station became Glencoagh Radio originally broadcasting from the village of Mountcharles and later from a cinema on the Main Street of Donegal town. Some of those involved in the station included Brian Curriston, Charlie Cannon and Jack Ramsey. The station closed in December 1988 after just over eighteen months on the air.

 

KTOK - 192mMW & 102.9mhzFM

KTOK was launched by Russ Padmore broadcasting from Donegal Town with studios located in the Castle Shopping Centre. The station began broadcasting on January 1^st 1987 and closed in accordance with the Wireless Telegraphy Act 1988 at 4p.m. December 31st 1988. In the studio that day were Russ Padmore, Gene Wilson, Tara Brady, David James and Hugo Boyce. On behalf of KTOK Media Services they thanked their sponsors, advertisers and listeners and played ‘Good-night Sweetheart’. Following that track they told their listeners that it was not Goodbye but just Goodnight and they played themselves off air with the theme from the television show Miami Vice.

Letterkenny Community Radio – 252m MW

LCR opened and closed 1983 and was based in Letterkenny.

                                   

Letterkenny Local Radio – 187m MW & 89.5mhzFM

Following the departure Simon O’Dwyer and Paul Millar from Radio Donegal, LLR went on the air in November 1980 broadcasting initially from 9am to 6pm. The Station closed in 1981.

^[2]

Northwest Community Radio - 269mMW & 103.5mhzFM

Northwest was launched by Jackie Crossan and Hugo Boyce in September 1984 with a one-kilowatt transmitter on medium wave and a 25-watt transmitter for their 103.5mhz FM transmitter. The station was located in Buncrana, County Donegal. Northwest closed with the introduction of the new laws in December 1988 with Jackie Crossan by that time had bought out of the station. Humorously the locals called the station because of its poor on air timekeeping as ‘No Watches or Clocks Radio’.^[3]

 

Radio 4U – 97.4mhz FM (later 96.6 & 100mhzFM)

The brainchild of Patrick Garten who had arrived from England to take advantage of the lax broadcasting laws and to broadcast primarily into Derry City, the station was initially located on the Southern side of the border in a cottage owned by Tom Brolly which had previously used as the location for City Sound Radio in County Donegal. After some test transmissions in early June 1987, the station officially went in air on Saturday June 6^th 1987.  In April 1988. The stations transmitters and equipment were sold to fellow Donegal station WABC and Radio 4U disappeared from the airwaves in May 1988.

Radio Jackie - 193mMW

An early 1980’s pirate station that broadcast in Donegal.

 

Radio North - 846khzAM & 103mhzFM

Radio North began broadcasting on November 18^th 1986 from studios located at Carndonagh, County Donegal. With a number of transmitter locations around the Foyle Peninsula the station aimed much of its broadcasts into Northern Ireland. The station was operated by Frank Callaghan. The station closed in December 1988 in accordance with the new Broadcasting legislation. In January 1989, Northside Radio came back on the air and continued for two years. Meanwhile Tommy Cunningham had opened North Atlantic Radio broadcasting on 954khz. In 1992 North moved from Carndonagh to Redcastle but their transmitters were causing interference to legal operators within Northern Ireland and moved again to Muff in Donegal. North disappeared from the airwaves but North Atlantic was rebranded as Radio North now broadcasting on 846khzAM.

 

In 2002 Paul Bentley took over the running of Radio North whose powerful transmitter could be heard in Dublin in 2011. Radio North promoted themselves as a C&W and Irish music station with family values and at weekends their airtime was sold to gospel and Christian broadcasters with the station announced as Gospel 846. Their own website states that,

‘Gospel 846 promotes family values through religious programming and family centred music programs.’

A quarter of a century after Radio North’s first broadcasts the station now broadcasts from studios at Shroove and transmitters located on the Moville Road. The station in various incarnations has been known as Northside Radio, Radio North County, Christian Radio 846, North 2000 and FM103.^[4]

 

Radio North Atlantic – 266m & 98mhzFM

Based near Carndonagh on the Inishowen peninsula, this station opened after the introduction of the new legislation in 1988. The brainchild of Tommy Cunningham who opened the station in competition with Radio North. The station was prosecuted in February 1993 following raids a number on the pirate stations located in Donegal.

 

Radio Nova - 233mMW & 97.9mhzFM

This version of Radio Nova began life as City Sound Radio broadcasting from a transmitter site in Donegal aimed into Derry City in 1985. The station moved to the small border village of Fahan in 1986 and was renamed Radio Nova 2 (to be different from the Dublin version). In April 1987 the ‘2’ was dropped and the station continued to broadcast until midnight December 31^st 1988 when it closed after a live broadcast from a pub in Buncrana.

 

WABC - 241mMW & 101.7mhzFM

Located at Greencastle, County Donegal WABC aimed its broadcasts at Northern Ireland especially the town of Coleraine. WABC at one time operated two stations WABC Hot Hits on 101.7mhz and WABC Gold on 101.2mhzFM. The stations closed in December 1988 only to return on the air in early 1989. The station finally closed when the station manager Paul Bentley departed for the UK.

 

Gospel 98 – 98mhz FM

Opened in 1989 by Angela Evans, this religious pirate broadcast a mixture of American preachers, rock music and bible quotations. The station was located on the Inishowen Peninsula in Donegal and broadcast into Northern Ireland. In February, their aerial was vandalised but it was quickly repaired only for that aerial to come crashing down during an Atlantic storm in March 1990. The insurance would not cover the damage as it ‘was an act of God’ and while with the help of fellow Donegal pirate, Radio North, the station opened an aerial fund, the station failed to get back on the air on its own but its programming was carried for four hours per day by Radio North from 3pm.

 

Tyrone Community Radio – 1512khz AM & 106.8mhzFM

TCR opened in May 1996, broadcasting from Strabane in County Tyrone but following raids by the British authorities that station relocated south of the border in the house at Castlefin near Lifford, Co. Donegal. With increased pressure from the authorities south of the border to discourage advertisers on the station, TCR began fundraising by holding dances and party themed events n and around Strabane. In August 2001, the station was raided but was back on the air within ten days. On November 24^th 2004, the station was raided again by the Gardai and officers from ComReg. Following that raid, the Donegal Democrat reported that,

‘A Castlefin farmer who allowed a pirate radio station to broadcast from his land was fined €100 and ordered to pay €1,500 in costs at a special sitting of Letterkenny District Court. Noel Burns, Ballylast, Castlefin, pleaded guilty to the charge which related to November 24, 2004. Mr Philip Rahan, BL, representing the Office of the Commission for Communications Regulator, prosecuted.

Evidence was heard from Mr Ivan Kiely, an official with the Commission, who said that he first picked up the frequency in the Lifford and Castlefin area in October 2004. On investigation he found that Tyrone Community Radio was operating from the defendant’s lands.

“They offer easy listening and main stream country music together with commercial advertising,” Mr Kiely said. The broadcast was traced to a pre-fab at Ballylast, Castlefin. On November 24, 2004, Mr Kiely arrived at the premises to execute a warrant. Mr Rahan explained that a DJ was broadcasting at the time the Commission officials arrived on site. An inventory was made of the radio equipment which was subsequently seized.’

On December 12^th 2007, TCR was raided again. John Barron of Drumdoit, Castlefin pleaded guilty to supplying electricity for broadcasting and two counts of supplying premises for broadcasting. William Baird with an address at Tirkeeran, Lifford also pleaded guilty to two charges of supplying electricity for broadcasting and one count of supplying premises for broadcasting. Judge Kilrane fined 68-year-old Barron €50 along with €750 costs for supplying electricity for broadcasting. Two charges of providing premises for broadcasting were taken into consideration.

 

Mr Tom Boyce, an inspector with ComReg told the court he had been monitoring radio signals from the TCR radio station on December 12, 2007 which in turn lead him to a prefabricated building at a premises in the Castlefin area. He reported that a man was seen running from the premises across a field but was quickly detained by a garda who had accompanied the inspection team. The prefabricated building contained the radio studio including computers, mixing desk, microphones and CD players. The electricity supply to the prefab was disconnected, he said, and a cable from a transmitter lead to another single story dwelling on the property. Boyce said he interviewed Baird who identified himself as the owner of the premises. He admitted disconnecting the electricity supply to the prefabricated building adding he believed the prefab was to be used for a taxi business and he would get help with paying the electricity bills.

 

Mr Boyce explained to the court that TCR played country music and advertisements for local businesses, adding the defendant was not at the core of running the station. William Baird was also fined €450 for supplying electricity plus €750 costs.

 

In August 2008, TCR was raided yet again but this time they were located north of the border and the warrants were executed by Ofcom and the Northern Ireland authorities. This was the sixteenth raid on the station. In 2013 the station went off the air in the hope of applying for an RSL.

 

But it was the closure of Radio Donegal after eighteen months on the air that created one of the most unique pirate radio experiments in the county. Don Clark who worked for Radio Donegal saw an opportunity to help publicise the various festivals around the country by creating a mobile service in a caravan travelling from town in town.

Radio Dungloe                        257m MW                  1981

Radio Downings                     192m MW                  1981

Radio Ceilteach                      192m MW                  1981    (Falcarragh)   

Radio Dungloe                        192m MW                  1983

Radio Lifford                          192m MW                  1983

Radio Twin Towns                 192m MW                  1983    (Ballybofey and Stranolar)

Radio Dungloe                        198m MW                  1985

Radio Cunamh                        187m MW & 96FM    1985    Letterkenny

Radio Killybegs                      192m MW                  1985

Radio Killybegs                      205m MW                  1986

The legal stations have included these stations including today’s leading local station, Highland Radio based in Letterkenny. Highland began broadcasting on March 15th 1990 having been awarded the new licence from the IRTC. The southern part of the county along with Sligo and Leitrim was covered initially by North West Radio but they lost their licence in 2004 to be replaced by Ocean FM. Community in the county in the past has included Inishowen Community Radio and Donegal Bay FM and today is served by temporary licences awarded to Owenea FM, Finn Valley FM and Rosses Radio. 

Today (February 2023) there is one pirate still operating in the county, Radio North.

https://www.facebook.com/DublinsPirateDays/videos/5878453322204545/

There are other non-licenced stations operating on FM across Donegal as various Catholic and Protestant churches broadcast Mass and services mostly on Sundays but also for funeral services.

Sources

The DX Archive

Radiowaves.fm

Pirate.ie

The Irish Pirate Radio Archive

The Anoraks Ireland Collection at DCU

The Irish Newspaper Archives

The British Newspaper Archives

Tommy Rosney

Russ Padmore   

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[1] Donegal Democrat

[2] The Donegal Democrat

[3] Gerry O’Reilly

[4] As of January 31^st 2023, the station was still on the air broadcasting illegally

World Radio Day 2023 - A Unique Irish Radio Centenary

 

To celebrate UNESCO’s WorldRadio Day 2023, I am delighted to announce that in August we will be celebrating the Centenary of the launch of Ireland’s first licensed radio station 2BP. Broadcasting from studios and a transmitter in the Royal Marine Hotel, Dun Laoghaire, their first broadcast was on Tuesday August 14^th 1923. Just after 11a.m., a voice, ‘clear and distinct’ greeted listeners,

‘2BP speaking.’

A series of well known Dublin musicians and singers travelled to Dun Laoghaire to perform in front of a microphone for the first time in Ireland. The station was on in conjunction with the annual Dublin Horse Show at the RDS. Once the announcer, Louis Wilson from the Marconi Company had greeted listeners with ‘2BP speaking’, he introduced the first act.

‘The next item on the programme will be a piano forte solo by Miss Clarke Barry’.

 

This August a special commemorative night will be held in the Royal Marine Hotel on Saturday August 12^th, when a book on the history of the station will be launched and you can tune into a tribute radio station that will transport you back to the 1920’s. Further details of how to tune in, where to buy a signed copy of the book and how to get a ticket to attend the event in the Royal Marine Hotel will be published later in the year.

 

As we conclude The Decade of Centenaries and as a nation we emerged from the trials and tribulations of war, in 1923 we were about to embrace the new medium of radio.

Bohemian Girl, the first movie broadcast on Irish Radio, 1937

 

It’s January 1937 and we need to be entertained. For two shillings or one and nine pence you could take your date to the Stephen’s Green Cinema and watch the latest treat from Laurel and Hardy, ‘The Bohemian Girl’. But what if you couldn’t go? Ireland’s radio station had the answer, they would broadcast the film, full of visual gags, on the radio, yes on the radio.

According to the film’s plot summary[1],

“A group of gypsy caravans set up on the edge of a wood. They realise they are camped on the estate of Count Arnheim who will not tolerate their presence. The gypsies sing and dance to entertain themselves.

Stanley Laurel and Oliver Hardy are the misfit pair of Gypsies in the group. When hen-pecked Oliver is out pickpocketing, fortune telling or attending his zither lessons, his wife Mae Busch, has an affair with Devilshoof played by Antonio Moreno. A cruel Nobleman, Count Arnheim, persecutes the Gypsies, who are forced to flee, but Mrs Hardy, in revenge for Devilshoof being lashed by the count's orders, kidnaps his daughter, Arline (Darla Hood), and Mrs. Hardy fools Hardy into thinking she is their daughter since he believes everything she tells him. She soon elopes with Devilshoof, and leaves Oliver and "Uncle" Stanley holding the toddler.”

The film also starred Thelma Todd, but more about her shortly.

In Ireland one of the most unusual aspects of showing this film was that despite the slapstick antics of the duo and the visual gags, the film became the first to be ‘shown’ on Radio Eireann.

‘As some of it is silent, the reaction of the audience to the antics of the stars should prove amusing listening to the listeners.’

That night, Friday January 15th, the station was celebrating the fact that 100,000 wireless licences had been taken out in the state, a decade after the launch of 2RN later to be Radio Eireann.[2] A microphone and telephone line from the cinema speakers relayed the show to the GPO. But despite the publicity surrounding this first, only the second reel of the 71 minute film was broadcast in the thirty minute slot at eight o’clock.

 

The Irish Press reported the following day

‘a running commentary was given by Mr. Henry[3], of the broadcasting studio, who described the antic of Laurel and Hardy, the stars. The famous songs were all rendered over the ether.’

 

The film generated additional interest as the film was based on the opera ‘The Bohemian Girl’ written by Dublin born Michael William Balfe. Balfe, Michael was born on May 15th May 1808, at 10 Pitt Street, Dublin, the street later renamed as Balfe Street in 1917 by the Dublin Corporation in his honour only to be later demolished completely. He was baptised in St Anne’s, Dawson Street, the same place where Dracula creator Bram Stoker would be married. He was the third child and only son of William Balfe, a renowned violinist and dancing master, and Kate Ryan. Balfe spent the early part of his life in Wexford, and received his first musical tuition in violin and piano from his father. His first public performance is thought to have been on May 30^th 1817 at a benefit concert held at the Rotunda, Dublin.

 

Balfe's career as a violinist had just begun when in January 1823, his father died. A desire to improve his music career and relieve the financial burden on his mother, he moved to London. He secured employment as an orchestra violinist at the Drury Lane Theatre, at the time under the direction of fellow Irishman Thomas Cooke. A decisive moment in his personal and professional life occurred in 1825 when he met wealthy Italian born Count Mazzara, who was taken by Balfe's uncanny resemblance to his recently deceased son, as well as his musical talent. Balfe accompanied Mazzara across Europe, where he remained for the next decade, focused on advancing his musical career.

 

He composed and produced his most popular work, ‘The Bohemian Girl’, at the Drury Lane Theatre on November 27th 1843, which ran for over one hundred nights in its first season. ‘The Bohemian girl’ was performed throughout Europe and America and is the only nineteenth-century British opera to enjoy a genuinely international reputation. Balfe died on October 20th 1870 and was buried in the Kensal Green Cemetery, London. Interestingly due to depiction of gypsies, the movie was banned in Nazi Germany. A critic at the time wrote of this film, "Composer, wouldn't like what Laurel and Hardy have done to his play. Then again, being Irish, perhaps he would."

 

Thelma Todd was one of the main cast when the film went into production at the Hal Roach studios. She was born in Massachusetts to John Shaw Todd, who was born in County Down, Ireland in 1871, the family emigrating to Boston in 1882. Her mother was Canadian born Alice Edwards. After winning the Miss Massachusetts pageant, she was spotted by Hollywood and initially signed by Paramount Pictures before joining Hal Roach who had Laurel and Hardy on his books.

 

The Bohemian Girl was Todd's last screen appearance before her controversial, suspicious death at aged 29. She died on December 15, 1935, just two months before the film was released. In an attempt to avoid associating the film with the notoriety surrounding the event, the plot was altered and many of her already-filmed scene clips were re-filmed. Her only featured scene that remains is her musical number, "Heart of the Gypsy", near the film's beginning, even here her singing voice is dubbed. Despite the coroner deeming the death accidental, she had been found in her car in her garage and the medical examiner said it was death by carbon monoxide poisoning, there was speculation that she had been killed by a former lover or a mafia linked small time gangster who had married her and was her business partner in a successful restaurant.

 

Off course Laurel and Hardy themselves would be no strangers to Ireland, staying at the Royal Marine Hotel in Dun Laoghaire for a month as they performed at the Olympia Theatre in 1953.

 

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[1] IMDB

[2] The population at the time in the Free State was just under 3 million.

[3] Patrick Henry

1923 Radio in Ireland - Infographic