The Philip B. Petersen Collection Broadcast January 29, 1998

     Radio amateurs like to experiment and improve their radio communications capabilities.  So it was with Guglielmo Marconi, the inventor of wireless radio communication.  Marconi took some known discoveries made by others (such as Henrich Hertz and Samuel F. B. Morse of telegraph fame) and developed them into a system to send telegraph messages without wires over very short distances at first.  Soon the wireless signal crossed the English Channel and others began to notice Marconi's achievements.  One of these was James Bennett, the publisher of the New York Herald newspaper.  He invited Marconi to come to America to see if he could report the events each day of the America's Cup Yacht races that would soon take place in the ocean off of Sandy Hook, New Jersey.
     Marconi arrived in America in September 1899 and set up a wireless receiving station on a tower on the north side of the Twin Lights Lighthouse high on the bluff overlooking the ocean at Highlands, NJ.  He then equipped the boat that was to follow the race each day with his spark transmitter that was capable of sending Morse code messages.
     The two yachts in the races were J. P. Morgan's yacht Columbia and Thomas Lipton's yacht Shamrock.  Incidentally, the Columbia won the race.  During the race events, Marconi sent over 5,000 words of news copy from the boat to his wireless receiving station at the Highlands Twin Lights.  From there the copy was relayed on by regular telegraph wire to the New York Herald, beating all of the other news reporters by several hours each day.  Marconi's wireless system proved to be a great success, adding greatly to the prestige of Marconi, and caused the publisher of the New York Herald to write praiseworthy comments in his newspaper about Marconi's wireless telegraph system.  Within two years, Marconi went on and demonstrated another great achievement when he received Morse code signals clear across the Atlantic Ocean from Poldhu, England to St. John's, Newfoundland, thus leaving no doubt about the long-range capabilities of wireless radio communications.
     All that remains now of Marconi's Twin Lights wireless station are some large stone anchors that supported the antenna.  However, two radio amateurs, Jeff Azoy, W2XZ and Pete Becker, N2PB, made a replica of Marconi's primitive receiving station which is on exhibit inside the lighthouse.  Each year radio amateurs of the Ocean-Monmouth Amateur Radio Club (OMARC) keep Marconi's historic event alive by setting up a radio station at the exact spot where Marconi's antenna stood and operate as a special event station for 24 hours, telling hundreds of other radio amateurs around the world of Marconi's very successful achievement that occurred at Twin Lights Lighthouse in October of 1899.

December 3, 1988

** Broadcasts recordings preserved and presented here by Mr. Robert Buss and Mr. Bernie Ricciardi, Phil's friends and fellow Marconi Chapter 138 QCWA members **

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