From David's Desk
February 24 2008
Radio SEAC Ceylon
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June 2007 Reunion at the Southampton Yacht Club.
L-R: Bill Reis,
Bernard Blakemore and Eric Hitchcock
© Eric Hitchcock Collection, Radio Heritage Foundation.
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We recently received a wonderful publication from Eric Hitchcock of
the UK. The background is the intense effort made by Lord Mountbatten
to improve the welfare of British and Allied troops in South East
Asia, the 'Forgotten Army' as they were sometimes called.
Always interested in radio, Mountbatten realized that having a radio
station for his forces would improve morale, and, with an eye to the
future, he thought a high powered radio station in Ceylon would be
useful after the war.
Eric was one of the team sent to Ceylon to bring the powerful 100kW
Marconi transmitter on the air, and he has brought together
information from his own experiences, those of friends, and detailed
research that includes studiously reading day after day of notes from
Mountbatten's own diaries.
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Radio SEAC produced 'SEAC Forces' Radio Times' a monthly program
guide.
The rising Phoenix logo was originally drawn by Lord
Mountbatten.
© Jack Fox Collection, Radio Heritage Foundation.
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Radio SEAC began broadcasts using a smaller 7.5kW transmitter, as
well as a low powered 3395kc outlet for the local audience. The new
100kW transmitter carried 'Forces Radio' across SE Asia, India and as
far away as China, Japan, and Australia and New Zealand.
We're very grateful to Eric for doing this research on one of the
founding stations of the British Forces Broadcasting Service and
bringing it all together as a fantastic research resource.
It contains the full story on the behind the scenes battles waged to
get the station on air during a time of wartime scarcity, and for a
theater of war that was becoming less valuable to the British as they
realized that they would no longer be able to keep control of India
after the war.
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View of the Radio SEAC transmitting site at Ekala from one of the
towers. The transmitter hall and powerhouse are in the bottom right.
© Bill Reis in 'Radio SEAC's Transmitters', Radio Heritage Foundation.
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Operating a powerful shortwave station in tropical conditions brought
about challenges of its own, and Eric puts the whole operation in
concise context, liberally illustrated with inside photos by the
staff during the construction and operation period.
Radio SEAC was later handed over to Radio Ceylon in 1949 and became
the mainstay of their incredibly popular commercial radio program
that was heard in households all over newly independent Ceylon, India
and Pakistan.
We're incredibly grateful to Eric for putting this story together,
and for generously making a copy available to our archives.
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 "Reunion at the Southampton Yacht Club")
 "'SEAC Forces' Radio Times' a monthly program guide.")
 "Radio SEAC transmitting site at Ekala")
