Andrea Langlois et al - Islands of Resistance - Pirate Radio in Canada

abolished, and regulatory powers were returned to the Department of
Marine and Fisheries. At first all licences were experimental; then in
1922 they were divided into broadcasting and receiving licences. 2
Back in the early years of radio, however, ship-to-shore communication
and telegraphy had a role to play in establishing regulatory patterns.
The availability of ships’ radio equipment provided a source of
small transmitters and accounted for a degree of mobility for some
stations. Commercial broadcasting was suspended during the First
World War, but hobbyists returned from the war with training in
radio communications. These skills fuelled the growth of the hobby
and eventually the industry. Few listeners could afford an expensive
floor model radio in the 1920s, so the majority of them assembled their
own inexpensive crystal sets from easily available materials. Early listeners
on crystal sets needed earphones so radio started largely as a
solitary activity, usually for boys and young men, in barns, garages
or attics to accommodate the leaky tubes. Women were also active in
amateur radio for many of the same reasons as their male counterparts.
3 Hobbyists not only listened for entertainment, but “DXing,”
or scanning the airwaves of distant stations, consumed much of their
time. Great distance was an achievement confirmed by postcards and
recorded on maps by DXers.
Resisting Frequency and Content Regulation:
Religion, Foreign Languages and Politics
Resistance to Regulation • 37
In the 1920s the first roster of Canadian broadcasters was almost all
independent and private. Many of the early stations were owned and
operated by those who had interests in newspapers, manufacturing
radios and railway companies. At the other end of the spectrum,
religious and other small but devoted broadcasters often valued their
messages over regulation. Dennis J. Duffy recounts a violation of the
regulations concerning the assignment of frequencies, in Imagine
Please: Early Radio Broadcasting in British Columbia. 4 Duffy recounts
how Dr. Clem Davies of the Centennial Methodist Church had his
radio station in operation in time for Easter Sunday of 1923. By 1924
Dr. Davies moved his ministry to the Victoria City Temple and moved
the radio station along with him by relocating the radio transmitter to
downtown Victoria and shifting position on the dial to CFCT. 5 He initially
operated without a licence as an amateur, not waiting for official