Amazing, the sound flies through the air! Tampere was the first in Finland to start broadcasting the radio of the miracle device that plays and talks. One hundred years later, broadcasts from the city continue.
This rumor started Tampere Radio’s program a hundred years ago.
In a hundred years, the broadcast has not been interrupted, even though the authors, content, technology and radio equipment have changed many times.
Enthusiastic engineers at the forefront
Regular public radio broadcasts began in the United States in November 1920. Information about the new invention quickly spread to Finland. The first Finnish experiments were done at Tampere Technical Institute, where Arvi Hauvonen also studied.
The Tampere Radio Association was founded in December 1923, and Hauvonen got help running the broadcasts. The operation of Tampere Radio was mainly financed by voluntary license fees and radio lotteries.
Radios and listening problems
At the time of Tampere Radio’s birth, the most handy built their crystal machines themselves, but you could already get radio equipment from stores. At least the Farmers’ Market of Häme promised to \”follow with special vigilance the radio flow that already prevails abroad and also in our country\”.
Audibility was considered from the point of view of the capital, so the article could be titled: \”Our radios are heard more than 500 km away – Can Helsinki ever be heard in the whole country\”. (SK, no. 49)
Tampere Radio was well on its way when O.Y. Finnish Public Radio – A.B. Finlands Rundradion was born in 1926. It was founded to manage the country’s public radio operations, and the program could be borrowed from it, or relayed, also to listeners in Tampere.
The radio law that came into effect the following year imposed license fees on listeners.
The number of listeners increased as the coverage area expanded. In 1930, Finland’s hundred thousandth radio license was redeemed. Yleisradio stations, among others Tampereen Radio, were transferred from the state to Yleisradio in 1934.
Do you know these sounds?
Tampere was also a pioneer of morning broadcasts
Yleisradio’s first broadcast channel was known as general program. In the 1960s, another, more entertaining channel was established, which was called a parallel program. Tampere Radio was heard there.
At the end of the 1960s, Yle’s provincial radio stations received news and the \”voice of the provinces\” was heard.
In the 1980s, Tampere Radio produced Päiväkatsaus together with Hämeenlinna editorials. In the evenings, there was a newscast, and at the end of the week, Saturday radio.
At that time, Tampere Radio also had correspondents from whom we received reports from at least Mänttä, Nokia, Valkeakoski and Vammala.
– There were two journalists and two sound monitors on the broadcast, one of whom monitored the sounds of the broadcast and the other changed tapes and discs. The fifth was the usher, who led the guests to the studio directly for the broadcast.
We went to the province by jeep and trailer
The morning broadcast was also sometimes made from neighboring municipalities. We went to the broadcast location the day before, so that the antennas could be pointed and the broadcast could be heard.
– We had a strong jeep and we put a trailer behind it. Especially in smaller towns, the arrival of Tampere Radio was a big deal. Premises were freely offered from, for example, municipal halls, and it was easy to get guests on the show, Anne Heino recalls.
In Yle’s 1990 channel reform, Tampere Radio became the home of Radio Suomi, which is still the most listened to channel in the country today. Radio broadcasts are still made in Tampere.
Here you can listen to Radio Suomen’s broadcast to Pirkanmaa on weekday mornings and afternoons.
Tastes from Tampere Radio
*Sources: Keskinen J. (Tekniikan Waiheita 4/14): Koko kaupuni radio, Raevaara Y. (Tre 1933): Tampereen Radio, ten-year phases,* *National biography*
*What does radio mean to you? And what kind of memories do you have specifically of Tampere Radio?*