Long Island’s early wireless history has been largely ignored by local historians.
Probably no other area in the America could equal Long Island for its density
of early radio stations. Its proximity to New
York City, the financial capital of the world, and to its harbor destined
Long Island to become the locus of transatlantic radio communications and
ship-to-shore wireless service for Atlantic shipping.
For over a half a century before the advent of satellite communications,
the overwhelming majority of transatlantic radio communications with the
United States funneled through Long Island facilities.
The first permanent wireless station in the US
was built at Siasconset on Nantucket Island and placed in operation August
12, 1901. The Marconi station at South Wellfleet in Cape Cod was originally
erected in 1901, but its antennas blew down before it was operational.
Cape Cod didn't get on the air until January of 1903.
The purpose of early wireless stations was to relay
traffic from ship to shore for profit. The Marconi
Company along with others set up a closed system. They
would supply the equipment and operators. The
equipment was installed aboard ship and at land stations by Marconi Company
employees. Radio contacts were always between Marconi owned stations.
Other Companies did the same thing. The thought
of using the system for distress wasn’t even considered.
It was a profit oriented service much as cell phones are today.
The first recorded use of the system for distress was off Nantucket Island
on January 23, 1909. Marconi had a station located
there at Siasconset on the island of Nantucket to relay messages from ships
coming from Europe on the New York and Boston. These
telegrams paid the bills.
The Royal Mail ship REPUBLIC was outbound with
well-to-do passengers on their way to the Mediterranean area for a fun filled
vacation trip. Off Nantucket the ship was rammed in the fog by the FLORIDA,
a ship loaded with immigrants from Italy headed for New York City. The Marconi operator, Jack Binns aboard the REPUBLIC
contacted Nantucket with the news. By this time,
ships were beginning to become equipped with wireless.
As the word of the disaster spread, many ships headed
for the area to be of assistance including two US Revenue Cutters.
Passengers were removed from both ships without
incident and the REPUBLIC eventually sank. This
was shortly before the TITANIC incident. Wireless
became the instrument for rescuing people and ships that were involved in
disasters at sea. The Wireless Companies became
reluctant participants in assisting in distress situations. The law of the sea at this time was that if you assisted
a distressed vessel in any way, the ship’s company could collect salvage
rights. This fact made captains reluctant to
ask for help.
Many
Companies tried to get into the maritime message business.
Long Island, sticking out into the ocean was an ideal
place to install the wireless gear, which only had a range of a few hundred
miles in the beginning.
Radio’s infancy saw Long Island serve as home of Marconi’s second and third
permanent stations in the United States, those at Sagaponack (Long Island’s
first) and Babylon (Long Island’s second) opening in 1902, followed by Sea
Gate in 1906. The Sagaponack and Babylon stations served also as schools
for Marconi operators. The stations at Sagaponack
and Sea Gate were often cited for facilitating assistance to vessels in distress. Both handled a heavy flow of Titanic survivor messages.
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The Royal Mail Ship (RMS) REPUBLIC
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The Babylon station was located on the Jacobs property, which extended from
Fire Island Avenue to Sumpwams Creek. A school for training telegraph
operators in wireless telegraphy operation and procedures was also established
there. There were from four to six students in the school all the time,
and the course of instruction ran about three weeks. They received free lodging
in the Jacobs cottage on the site. Upon successful completion of the
course, they were employed by the Marconi Company at a salary of from $60
to $100 a month.
1918 shot of the Sayville
Station while operated by the Navy
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The small 12 by 14 foot station building, abandoned
when the station closed in early 1907, was found and purchased in 1930 by
famed inventor Edwin H. Armstrong (super heterodyne, FM radio) and presented
to RCA president David Sarnoff, and had it transported to RCA’s Radio Central
site in Rocky Point. Today it is in the possession
of the Rocky Point School district, which maintains it on the school grounds. Once a year on Marconi day, local radio amateurs
activate this site.
In 1912 the most powerful and advanced commercial wireless station in the
United States, the first able to consistently span the Atlantic, was erected
in West Sayville by the German firm, Telefunken. Its landmark 500-foot antenna
tower was the tallest structure on Long Island. Through
its sister station in Nauen, Germany, The Great Sayville Station, as it was
known, provided the most reliable radiogram and newspaper press service to
Europe then available. It also provided ship-to-shore service for the Hamburg-American
and North German Lloyd lines.
RCA’s “Radio Central,” opening in 1921 on a 10 square mile site at Rocky
Point, was the world’s largest and most powerful transmitting station of
its time. Its 2,000-acre receiving station at
Riverhead bristled with antennas of the most advanced design. Its Long Island research laboratories employed many
of the most brilliant minds in radio technology and for decades literally
wrote the book on the subject. |
Beginning in 1927, Mackay Radio and Telegraph (later ITT World Communications)
opened stations at Sayville, Southampton, Napeague, and Brentwood, providing
international point-to-point communications and high seas ship-to-shore service. At the height of submarine warfare during WWII, Mackay
operators at Southampton reported receiving upwards of ten SOS calls a day
from vessels on the Atlantic.
Mackay's Brentwood Station around 1984
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Mackay's
Southampton receiving Station. This shot was taken about 1982.
This Building housed both point-to-point and marine (WSL). Operators
here keyed remote transmitters located at Amagansett (Napeague) (MackayAm)
and later HF transmitters relocated from Amagansett to Brentwood.
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Press Wireless, Inc. was formed in 1929 by a group of newspapers to meet
demand for rapid transmission of news dispatches throughout the world. In 1930 it opened transmitting facilities on a 185-acre
site in Hicksville and a receiving station at Baldwin Harbor. In 1957 transmitting operations were relocated to
a 500-acre site in Centereach, where it operated 47 high power transmitters. Receiving was relocated to Northville. In addition, PW provided military radio links
throughout the world during WWII.
The voices of wartime news correspondents
in Europe, such as Edward R. Morrow, received for AM broadcast were received
through the Long Island receiving stations of RCA at Riverhead, Press Wireless
at Baldwin or Mackay Radio at Southampton.
Marconi's Sagaponack Station
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Naval Station at Amagansett
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There were also de Forest stations
at Quogue, Manhattan Beach and Long Beach. The
US Navy had stations at Amagansett, Montauk Point, Fire Island, and Rockaway
Beach. Independent Wireless Telegraph Company
operated ship-to-shore stations at Babylon, East Hampton and East Moriches,
as did Globe Wireless in Garden City.
A Voice of America international
broadcast station was built on Long Island in 1941.
Operated by CBS from 1942 to 1963, the station shared the 1,100-acre
Brentwood site of Mackay Radio and Telegraph Co., beaming the outputs of
its three 50,000 watt transmitters to Europe and South America using extensive
arrays of directional antennas.
At Sayville, L.I. Telefunken of Germany set up a large
station shortly before WW1. When we went to war,
the U.S. Navy took over the station. The Navy
early on recognized the value of wireless communication with their ships.
Navy's second
station at Montauk about 1921. Probably located on the eastern shore
of Fort Pond Bay. Ti appears the building is outfitted for a DF antenna,
but another building (to the right) adds a bit of confusion.
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An overall shot of the Montauk
buildings abt 1921
When Radio Corporation of America was formed from
the Marconi Company, they soon built the largest transmitting and receiving
stations in the world at Rocky Point and Riverhead, L.I.
These were tied by telephone line to their message center at
Broad Street in Manhattan. Today nothing remains
but some state signs proclaiming it the David Sarnoff outdoor recreation
area and some large pieces of concrete deep in the Rocky Point woods.
Long Island’s rich history includes the expansion
of wireless radio technology. This story is not generally depicted in history
books. Hopefully this will help to bridge the gap.
Easthampton station later acquired by Independent Wireless Telegraph
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