Eighty years ago today, the December 29, 1941, issue of Broadcasting showed Private Milton Shaw of Cleveland, Georgia, standing guard over the 50,000 watt transmitter of KIRO, Seattle, sited on Vashon Island. The soldier was one from the 41st Division. The magazine claimed that the station was “located in the center of a large colony of Japanese nationalists.” The magazine noted that the station was the only 50,000 watt station north of San Francisco and Salt Lake City.

According to this source, Shaw was killed in Action in New Guinea on June 17, 1944, and his remains are buried at Oakwood Cemetery, Oakwood, Georgia.

Eighty years ago, this young woman is pulling in a favorite program with this camera-style portable radio. The brand is not stated, but it has five tubes, including the rectifier, and can operate either from battery or, as she is using it here, standard household current. It had the option of use with a separate window antenna to increase the sensitivity. It was finished with gray plastic, with a dark blue covering of simulated leather.

A few days after this picture appeared in the December 1941 issue of Popular Science, she was probably using the same set in a more somber mood to pull in the latest bulletins from Pearl Harbor.

Fifty years ago this month, the November 1971 issue of Electronics Illustrated carried the story of Ivan The Terrible, the Soviet interloper who interfered with Nazi broadcasts during the war.

Deutschlandsender broadcast its German home service on 191 kHz, with broadcasts including the news. One day in 1941, listeners were able to hear additions to the news broadcast. For example, if the announcer said, “new victories have been won by the Wehrmacht,” another voice completed the sentence with “in the grave.”

The voices were coming from Soviet Station RW-1 at Noginsk, near Moscow. The engineers at that station were able to tune the 500 kW transmitter from its original frequency of 172 kHz and synchronize it with the German station to avoid any heterodyne. Eventually, the Germans were forced to put their news broadcasts on mediumwave, and use their powerful longwave transmitter for entertainment programs.

When the Russian source of the broadcasts was known, it was dubbed Ivan The Terrible, and that name is used in this 1941 Time magazine article from September 15, 1941.

According to the 1971 Electronics Illustrated article, British and American intelligence issued a report disclosing the identity of Ivan the Terrible. Unfortunately, however, the American copy of the report was misfiled and was lost somewhere in the Washington catacombs. The British copy was still covered by the Official Secrets Act and couldn’t be made public until 1991.

But the author of the article did enough digging to give “a pretty good idea” as to the identity. According to the 1971 article, the instigator was Sololmon Abraham Lozovsy.
Despite his service to the Soviet Union, Lozovsky became the victim of one of Stalin’s purges. Even though Krushchev later issued a pardon, it came a bit too late, since Lozovsky was shot in 1952.

The actual voice of Ivan The Terrible was that of Bohemian Ernst Fischer.  After winding up on the wrong side of the Austrian civil war, he found his way to Moscow where his fluency in German was put to good use. After the war, Fischer brought his communism back to Austria, where he remained a figure in the Austrian Communist Party until 1969, serving as the Communist Minister of Information immediately after the war.

For a similar use of radio during the war, see our earlier post on Soldatensender Calais.

Shown here, in the October 11, 1941, issue of Radio Guide is a photo of CBS correspondent William Shirer, conferring with a German naval officer acting as his censor. Shirer had recently returned to America after being posted in Berlin, and the magazine offers some of his recollections.

For most of his term in Berlin, Shirer had lived in an apartment, but for the last year of his assignment, he had lived at the Adlon Hotel.  Since the hotel catered to foreigners, it was one of the last places in Berlin to have hot water constantly available. In fact, Shirer often met with officials in his room, and was able to provide those officials with a hot bath.

The article served partially as a tease for Shirer’s forthcoming book, Berlin Diary,  which is still available. The book recounted his years in Berlin. Shirer is best known as the author of The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich.

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Eighty years ago this month, the September 1941 issue of Radio Retailing carried this ad for Emerson’s lineup for the coming model year.  It turns out these would be the last models made until 1946, as civilian radio and phonograph production ended for the duration on April 22, 1942.

Civilian Technical Corps member training, 1941. Wikipedia photo.

The August 1941 issue of Radio Service Dealer carried this article describing something I had never knew existed, the Civilian Technical Corps, an Anglo-American quasi-military organization. It was essentially a branch of the British military manned by American civilians, primarily working in radio. Members wore a uniform identical to the Royal Air Force.

The magazine described the Corps as being comprised of skilled craftsmen who performed non-military duties in Britain. American technicians were being recruited to maintain and repair radio equipment. By placing Americans in these slots, Englishmen were freed up for combat duty.

“There are a number of men, who, although perfectly loyal American citizens and willing to die in the defense of their country, would prefer to retain their civilian status. Enlistment with the Civilian Technical Corps qualifies a man for deferment from the draft, and does so with the full consent and approval of President Roosevelt. All local draft boards have been authorized to put CTC volunteers in Class II-B, for it is felt that this civilian occupation is of notable importance to our own National Defense. Enlistment in the CTC thus enables a man to satisfy his patriotic urge even though his is not serving in the armed forces.”

Pay ranged from $24.12 to $38.65 per week, but the magazine noted that this was actually quite generous, since food, clothing, and shelter were all provided. It was thus the equivalent of a salary of $50 to $75 per week, and also offered free passage to England.

Interested men were directed to apply to the British Consulate General in New York.  From this site, it appears that 21 members of the Civilian Technical Corps died in the line of duty, 19 of whom were lost in the Atlantic on October 15, 1941.  Perhaps some of those men were going off to England in response to this article,  and were indeed perfectly loyal American citizens and willing to die in the defense of their country, albeit in a civilian status.