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Site of First Radio Broadcast, December 24, 1906, By Reginald A. Fessenden
Plaque Presented on December 24, 1966 By
Massachusetts Broadcasters' Association and The Broadcast Pioneers
To The Marshfield Historical Commission In Helen Fessenden's book, "Fessenden : Builders of Tomorrows", she writes - "On Christmas Eve and New Year's Eve of 1906 the first Broadcasting occurred. Three days in advance Reg had his operators notify the ships of The U.S. Navy and of The United Fruit Co. that were equipped with the Fessenden apparatus that it was the intention of the Brant Rock Station to broadcast speech, music and singing on those two evenings. "Describing this, Fessenden wrote : "The program on Christmas Eve was as follows: first a short speech by me saying what we were going to do, then some phonograph music, the music on the phonograph being Handel's 'Largo'. Then came a violin solo by me, being a composition of Gounod called 'O, Holy Night' and ending up with the words 'Adore and Be Still' of which I sang one verse, in addition to playing on the violin, though the singing of course was not very good. "Then came the Bible text, 'Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace to men of good will' and finally we wound up by wishing them a Merry Christmas and then saying that we proposed to broadcast again New Year's Eve. "The broadcast on New Year's Eve was the same as before, except that the music was changed and I got someone else to sing. I had not picked myself to do the singing, but on Christmas Eve I could not get any of the others to either talk, sing or play and consequently had to do it myself. "On New Year's Eve one man, I think it was Stein, agreed to sing and did sing, but none of the others either sang or talked". and Get Some Christmas Presents Re-create Fessenden's Christmas Eve Broadcast with help from these FREE DOWNLOADS - Free MidiNotate Player converts any MIDI file to Sheet Music with amazing accuracy Look for Fessenden's Bible Reading with user friendly e-Sword software Find Out About The Fourth Graders' Do-It-Yourself Crystal Radios Build A Crystal Radio and Learn More About Early British Broadcasting History Did you ever watch BBC TV's "Blue Peter" ? Then, if you can find a room with a very, very HIGH ceiling to put it in, why not BUILD YOURSELF A MODEL OF FESSENDEN's RADIO MAST ? :-) :-) :-) :-) :-) All you need are - 20 cardboard-tube inserts from the inside of your mum's paper kitchen towel rolls, another large sheet of strong cardboard (perhaps one of your local shop's empty potato crisp boxes might do) and lots and lots of string ! The cardboard tube inserts are 5 cm in diameter and Fessenden's radio mast was built from tubes that were 5-feet in diameter so, on a scale of 1 cm = 1 foot, your mast is going to look very realistic ! Cut up some of your cardboard sheet into, at least twenty 8-centimetre squares and, using your school compasses, mark the centre of each square and draw a two-and-a-half centimetre radius circle (to push the tubes through) - You'll need to experiment here because these 'flanges' will need to be glued on to each other when you begin to assemble your mast ! Get your dad, or another adult to help you ! Now all you need to do is work out how to put everything together so that it can be rigged properly into the ground plan here (which you will need to enlarge on a photocopier and then stick it on to a big piece of cardboard ! O.K. - Here's the Ground Plan and a photograph of the mast and all the rigging and the anchor bolts ! - Good Luck ! :-) :-) :-) 
Maybe you'd better look at some of the other photos to get the rigging right ! :-) :-) :-) | 
Friday, October 6, 2006 was Reginald Fessenden's 140th Birthday (born 1866)