Radio age research, manufacturing, communications, broadcasting, television (1941)

RADIO LINKS ALL NATIONS RCA Has Evolved Revolutionary Changes in International Comnuini- cations-Rodio Circuits Encircling the Earth Handle Millions of Words. By Lieut. Col. Thompson H. Mitchell Vice President & (Jeueiai Muiiayei-, R.C.A. Com-munications, Inc. ANEW ERA in the history of international telecommunica- tions was born when the Radio Cor- poration of America a quarter of a century ago initiated its plans for a world-wide radio telegraph com- munications system centering in the United States. A 1919 map of submarine cable routes would have shown how tenu- ous and insecure were the links connecting this country with the rest of the world. Across the At- lantic, a handful of slow and nearly obsolete cables landing only in Great Britain and France, with many of them foreign-owned; to South America, a tortuous system of short cable loops running from port to port down the West Coast of South America and thence across the Andes by landline to Argen- tina; and across the Pacific, just one slim thread of cable to serve Hawaii and all the Far East. American telegrams to and from ail other parts of the world had to pass over cable systems owned and operated by foreign interests, predominantly British. London was the communications center of the world. America's sole hope of be- coming an important factor in world communications lay in radio and RCA set out to do the job. On March 1, 1920, after months of painstaking preparation, the first RCA transoceanic direct radio circuits were opened. The most im- portant was between New York and London. The others were between San Francisco and Honolulu, and between Honolulu and Japan. Di- rect circuits with Norway, Ger- many and France were established before the end of the year. Little by little, traflic volume increased, and stride by stride the research engineers and operating staff im- proved equipment and technique. Meets First Big Test In the summer of 1922, several of the transatlantic cables were out of commission for a week or so, and and it was then that radio really demonstrated its latent potentiali- ties. Under the pressure of sheer uecessitv RCA's transatlantic cir- cuits handled a volume of traffic far exceeding theoretical capacity. Shortly thereafter, in April. 1923, transatlantic cable rates of all com- panies were reduced to meet those of RCA. RCA was now beginning to hit its stride. Direct circuits with Italy and Poland were opened in 1923, and with short waves in the offing, new and reassuring possibil- ities in the way of long-distance communication began to loom up. At the end of 1923, RCA had bridged the Atlantic and the Pa- cific, but had not been able to span the gap between North and South America. This was rectified in Jan- uary, 1924, however, when the United States and Argentina were linked together by a direct 6,000 mile radio telegraph circuit — the longest radio telegraph circuit to be operated up to that time. Before the end of the year a new direct circuit with Sweden had also been opened. Short waves were now com- ing into their own. With RCA's cable competitors now fully awake and determined to put the young radio upstart in its place, a new submarine cable con- necting the United States with Italy by way of the Azores was opened in March, 192.5. While RCA prepared to meet this new challenge in the Atlantic, the Commercial Pacific Cable Company deemed it an opportune time to lower its rates to Japan — thus equalizing with those of RCA and assuring more competition in the Pacific as well as in the Atlantic. RCA had an ace of its own how- ever, and countered by opening a IN THE EARLY 20'S, RCA's INTERNATIONAL RADIOTELEGRAPH SERVICE OPERATED WITH MASSIVE ANTENNA TOWERS (LEFT) AND ALEXANDERSON ALTERNATORS (CENTER). WHICH GENERATED LONG WAVES. TODAY, RELATIVELY SMALL WOODEN POLES SUPPORT ANTENNAS (RIGHT) FOR WORLD-WIDE SHORTWAVE COMMUNICATION. rg RADIO AGEj i^i i