History of radio in Germany

This article describes the history of radio in Germany. A more general radio history can be found in History of Radio , the radio history of Austria in History of Radio in Austria , that of Switzerland in History of Radio in Switzerland .

The history of radio in Germany specifically includes the technical, program and organizational history of radio and radio in Germany and its forerunners under international law ( German Empire , GDR , Federal Republic of Germany ).

The 210 m high, still preserved transmitter mast on the Funkerberg in Königs Wusterhausen . Here was the cradle of radio in Germany.

The beginnings

Development up to the first broadcast in 1923

In the First World War saw the first experiments with tube stations (s. Electron tube ) and feedback recipients by Hans Bredow and Alexander Meissner , where music has already been transferred to acceptable quality. Another technical possibility of transmitting sounds was with the arc transmitters developed by Valdemar Poulsen and produced by the C. Lorenz company in what was then Tempelhof near Berlin . The first musical test broadcasts (concerts “An Alle” ) were broadcast by the Eberswalde experimental radio station from 1919 onwards.

In 1920 the Reich Telegraph Administration began building a network of “press reception centers”. These were specially designed to provide journalists and press organs with the latest news and gradually replaced wire telegraphy . This technique transmitted text, not a spoken word.

On 22 December 1920, the first broadcast of the found German postal from the station King Wusterhausen instead of a Christmas concert. Post workers played instruments they had brought with them, sang songs and recited poems. The Funkerberg is therefore considered the birthplace of public broadcasting in Germany. Until the advent of television, the expression “broadcasting” was identical to radio (at times also called “radio broadcasting” or “sound broadcasting”).

At that time, broadcasting consisted of three pillars: the press broadcasting founded in 1920 with political and economic news for newspaper editors, the business broadcasting founded in 1922 with business news mainly for banks, and the "entertainment broadcasting". The wireless news services remained lucrative for the Reichspost for years, but entertainment broadcasting took hearts by storm.

The so-called Funkerspuk was decisive for the development of the young medium : following the Russian model, revolutionary workers occupied the headquarters of the German press news on November 9, 1918 and misleadingly proclaimed the victory of the radical revolution ( USPD , KPD , Spartakusbund ) in Germany. In response to this action, the SPD government tightened its control over the young medium:

• Funkregal ("Funkhoheit"): sovereign right of the Reich to set up and operate transmitting and receiving systems (from around 1919);
• Ban on receiving radio broadcasts for private individuals (around 1922, repealed 1923);
• 

  Radio license to listen to the radio in 1934
  Limitation of the technical properties of receiving devices, ban on feedback , authorization requirement ; Introduction of the license fee from 1923.

From 1922 onwards, the Wirtschaftsrundspruchdienst was the first to operate a regular, fee-based radio. On April 6, 1923, Siegmund Loewe and Eugen Nesper founded the first radio club in Berlin , the Deutsche Radio-Klub eV. In addition, the Association of the Broadcasting Industry was established , which organized the first large German radio exhibition in Berlin in 1924 .

The birth of radio in Germany on October 29, 1923. On this day, the first entertainment program was broadcast from the Vox-Haus (see: Funk-Hour Berlin ). The Berlin cigarette dealer Wilhelm Kollhoff is the first official radio participant in Germany . At the beginning, the license to listen to the program in 1923 - it was the time of hyperinflation  - cost 60  gold marks or 780 billion paper marks . 60 gold marks, adjusted for inflation, correspond to 17 euros in today's currency.

Chronology until 1932

Strong growth in the number of fee-paying listeners between mid-1923 and late 1925

Advertisement for the license fee in the yearbook of the Funk-Hour Berlin 1926

In the spring of 1924 the participation fee was reduced to 2 Rentenmarks and on May 29 the first radio exhibition took place in Hamburg.

On January 31, 1925, the first shortwave radio transmission from the USA could be heard in Germany. On April 4th, the European World Broadcasting Association was founded as the International Radio Union (IRU), and on May 15th the Reichs-Rundfunk-Gesellschaft , the umbrella organization of broadcasting under the umbrella of the Reichspost. On November 1st, Bernhard Ernst gave the first live commentary on a football match between Preußen Münster and Arminia Bielefeld on the radio.

The first international soccer match that was broadcast on radio in Germany was the match between Germany and the Netherlands on April 18, 1926 in the Rheinstadion in Düsseldorf . On June 1, the Reich Ministry of Post created the first " Reich Broadcasting Commissioner". The first test transmitter for shortwave broadcasting in Germany went into operation on September 1st . The radio tower in Berlin was inaugurated on September 3rd . Also in 1926 the Deutsche Welle GmbH (from January 1, 1933 Deutschlandsender GmbH ) went on the air.

From October 4 to November 25, 1927, the International World Radiocommunication Conference took place in Washington, DC (USA) . The organizing International Telegraph Association (now the International Telecommunication Union ) organized the radio frequencies and wavebands for the first time worldwide for the member countries by signing the Third World Radio Treaty , a supplementary agreement to the Berlin and London International Radio Telegraph Conventions of 1906 and 1912 . For the first time, shortwave bands were also assigned . Even before the World Radio Conference, on April 19, 1927, the International Radio Union set up an International Wave Control Center in Brussels.

Trade journal "The Radio Dealer", 1927

On December 20, 1927, the Deutschlandsender II began broadcasting on long wave (240 kHz) in Zeesen . At that time it was the strongest radio broadcaster in Europe. The shortwave test transmitter AFK was also launched in December in Döberitz , west of Berlin.

In October 1928, the Deutsche Reichspost gave the Telefunken Gesellschaft für wireless Telegraphie mbH the order to build a shortwave transmitter ( world radio transmitter ) in Zeesen .

On January 1, 1929, the frequency agreements of the Washington World Radio Treaty came into force. The Zeesen world radio broadcaster began operations on August 26, 1929. On December 2nd, Radio Madrid broadcast 25 minutes of a concert broadcast by the world broadcaster on wave 31.38. On December 25, the US broadcaster NBC took over the German Christmas program; it was the first program exchange with the USA. In January 1932 this exchange agreement was extended. The first directional spotlight for North America went into operation on January 22, 1932. On August 19, the Reichspost presented the first radio receiver with a shortwave receiver module at the 9th Great German Radio Exhibition in Berlin .

1932: The Rundfunk Jahrbuch 1933 provides radio statistics for the period from January to August 1932:

• In the seven-month period, the empire's ten main broadcasters broadcast 33,000 hours. (That is, more than half of the day was on the program.)
• Of the 33,000 operating hours, 28,000 were in the field of art. (see below)
• 274,000 people worked in German radio, 165,000 of them "foreigners".
• The international program exchange delivered 157 programs and took over 156 programs from abroad.
• The performances included opera (285, with a staff of 66 authors), operetta (103 performances, 30 authors), drama (180 performances, 74 authors) and radio plays (460 with 246 authors). In other words, the radio plays far exceeded all other artistic forms of broadcasting, and the authorship was also large.
• The yearbook also estimated the number of listeners: worldwide, 49.6% of all radio participants were in Europe, 46.2% in America. The US had 15.8 million listeners, the UK 4.8, Germany 4, Russia 3, France 1.5 and Italy 1.2 million.

The way to the mass medium

The Reich Telegraph Office was responsible for the introduction of radio technology. Logo of the TRA around 1910

Structure of the transmitter network

The forerunners of broadcasting in Germany were press broadcasting and business broadcasting , also known as "Wirtschaftsrundspruch", operated by Eildienst GmbH , with a manageable number of well-paying professional receivers from newspapers and publishers (press broadcasting) and banking and large-scale industry (business broadcasting) which were supplied with news from the transmitter in Königs Wusterhausen across the entire Reich. Business broadcasting started in 1922 with 762 reception points in 255 locations and was initially a success: two years later there were 1181 reception points in 513 locations. The Reichspost experimented from 1920 to 1922 with a "radio reception network". In 1922 there were 76 suitable reception systems.

The State Secretary in the Reich Post Ministry, Hans Bredow, developed the idea of ​​an equally centralized new service from the success of press and business broadcasting, which he called “entertainment broadcasting”. Bredow was unable to assert itself against the influence of the state governments, and so the Reichspost began building a decentralized transmitter network. The Berlin transmitter in October 1923 was the first, and Munich followed a few months later. Both institutions were successful with their entertainment programs, whereby in addition to music and literature readings, business news and weather reports ("weather reports") played a special role right from the start, not least among the rural population, who until then had to rely on newspapers that were sent a day later by Post were delivered. The newspaper publishers were skeptical of the growing network. They feared that the "newspaper radio" would replace the newspaper. On the other hand, newspapers already set up sections with news from the radio as early as 1925 to underline their own topicality.

Spurred on by the increasing revenue from fees, the aim in 1924 was to cover the entire Reich territory with transmitters with a range of 150 km each. When "dead districts" remained, i.e. areas with no reception, the Reichspost increased the number of broadcasting stations to 20, the last of which started in Freiburg, the Palatinate and the Prussian Rhine region between November 1926 and early 1927. For cost reasons, some broadcasters, such as those in Hamburg, Bremen, Hanover and Kiel, formed associations and “shared” programs among themselves.

Federal structure

The London Times lists the German channels (August 22, 1925)

The federal structure of the broadcasters led to individual programming, which the editors, however, had to coordinate with the telegraph administration in order, as it was called in the initial considerations, to “prevent commercial exploitation”. Funds came from the listeners' radio licenses, and the Ministry took care of the infrastructure. At the end of 1926, the Oberpostrat Thurn in Berlin determined that these were decisive prerequisites not to commercialize broadcasting and to subject it to economic interests. The government imposed strict rules of non-partisanship on word-of-mouth broadcasts on broadcasters. In order to keep track of the implementation and to reprimand misconduct, it introduced "monitoring committees" for the individual broadcasting districts, in which representatives of the Reich and the federal states sat. In order to avoid discrepancies in advance, each broadcaster had to set up a “cultural advisory board” made up of three to seven people who were determined at the local level but approved by the Reich Ministry of the Interior.

The cultural flagship of the young German radio world was the German broadcaster . Because of its wavelength of 1,300 m, it reached large parts of the empire and mainly sent educational lectures. In addition to Deutsche Welle GmbH , the Central Institute for Education in Berlin also participated in this educational mandate. The Berlin broadcaster or a foreign broadcaster provided the evening program with a series of lectures.

Radio reception regulations

Initially, the owners of receiving devices had to complete training in order to use the new technology responsibly. In addition to explaining that eavesdropping on certain frequencies was a criminal offense, the most important thing for radio owners was to understand how to curb the transmission capability of their device by avoiding feedback (which they then turned into transmitters themselves). In September 1925, the devices were so easy to use that the Reichspost dropped the test and sent everyone interested a “certificate of approval for a receiving system”. The Postal Ministry was in a hurry to attract new fee payers and instructed postmen to only take up the applications by speaking to the customer and to deliver the document the next day.

The license allowed the operation of several receiving devices, but not at the same time. There were no local restrictions for private listening to the radio; as fee payers, you could listen to the radio in the garden and on the ship. Listening to the radio in public was problematic because a regulation from the time before the radio came into play, namely to pay entertainment tax. The "reproduction of radio presentations through loudspeaker presentations in cafés, etc." The courts decided on this differently. The question of whether a landlord must allow his tenant to operate a reception system had not yet been finally clarified. In 1926, most of the proceedings were decided in favor of the tenant. On the other hand, a ruling by the German Reich Court of May 12, 1926 clearly regulates the “radio copyright”, which requires the broadcaster to obtain permission from the artist for the respective work before it is broadcast. In many rural areas with poor radio reception, there were differences with the Reich Postal Ministry and the police authorities because local police regulations hindered the construction of "air ladder systems". In 1927 these differences were resolved.

First broadcasts, first black listeners

One of the first radios from Siemens & Halske , also known as the "express train" because of the interconnected components.

When the first broadcasting company started broadcasting on October 29, 1923 with the Funk-Hour Berlin , there was not a single paying listener; at the end of the year there were 467. The Reich Telegraph Administration had set the annual fee at 25  gold marks , which was then - in the middle of the inflationary period - "multiplied by the ratio valid on the day of payment for the calculation of telegraph fees in foreign transactions".

According to the "Telegraphengesetz" (formerly: Telegraphs Act of the German Reich of 1892), there were severe penalties for black listeners: a fine and, in extreme cases, imprisonment of up to six months. The increase in the annual fee on January 1, 1924 to 60  Rentenmarks - about a third of the average monthly income - deterred many interested listeners from acquiring a broadcasting license. The “Funknotverordnung” issued on March 8, 1924 tightened the penalties again, but granted amnesty to all black listeners who reported to the post office by April 16. 54,000 participants reported themselves in this campaign.

The number of participants only increased significantly after the annual fee had been set at 24 Rentenmarks on May 14, 1924, retroactively to April 1. On January 1, 1924, there were 1580 radio users in Germany. At the end of the year, 548,749 participants had registered, and one year later the million mark was exceeded. From the sale of radio components, however, it can be concluded that most people still made their own radio receivers and did not register them.

Ernst Hardt , first director of the Westdeutsche Rundfunk AG Werag (later WDR ), saw it as problematic to threaten non-paying listeners with prison and the destruction of their family relationships. The Deutsche Reichspost built and maintained large parts of the broadcasting infrastructure and retained 40% of the broadcasting licenses. The Post urged the program makers to get the listeners more aggressively to comply with the regulations: "There should be a real hunt with traps that really snap and snares that really catch, and we should help," said Hardt in the evening program. “But we don't want to be the hunters of people we love because they hear us.” Hardt ended the lecture by announcing that this was the last call before the “black listener raid”: “Let me take this sad one Yes, to close this really serious beginning of a 'fun evening' with the hope that this warning will suffice to help us to get the reward for our work and to help you out of a danger that tomorrow, the day after tomorrow, every day and everyone The hour could end badly for you: a fine and the loss of your device or jail. God knows, don't let it get there for the measly two marks! "

The London Times closely observed the development of radio broadcasting in the Weimar Republic and reported in 1927:

“The first German broadcasting company, Berliner Funk Stunden A. G. , was founded in October 1923, in times of great monetary inflation and social unrest. The cost of the first radio license was 60 gold marks or 780 billion of the then current national currency; these numbers give a good idea of ​​the conditions of time. Nevertheless, by the end of the year there were over a thousand optimists who were ready to spend these enormous sums of money on the privilege of listening to the first German radio programs. After the currency stabilized, the fee sank to 24 gold marks per year, the equivalent of £ 1 4 shillings, where it is to this day. In Germany there are now almost two million radio subscribers. "

- The Times : Broadcasting In Germany. Twenty-Five Stations. October 6, 1927, p. 6 translated from English

In Germany, the government perceived the growing number of black listeners ( onlookers ) as a massive threat and imposed fines and prison sentences of up to six months for black listeners. These provisions were tightened further by the “Funknotverordnung” of March 8, 1924 (see also: Audion test permit ). As control measures began to take hold, the government's confidence in the medium increased. Radio was established as a non-political and non-partisan entertainment service through further administrative measures. Nevertheless, the Reichspost had a major influence on the new medium through the First Broadcasting Reform in 1926. With cultural advisory boards and monitoring committees, the program was controlled by the federal states and the Reich Ministry of the Interior. The Reichspost had the say in the newly founded umbrella organization of the Reichsrundfunk Gesellschaft (RRG), which was supposed to review the regional companies economically and to represent them externally. The chairman was Hans Bredow . The Reich Ministry of the Interior founded two broadcasting companies to broadcast daily news as well as musical, scientific and literary contributions. Another license was given to the Vox group, which was interested in a new advertising medium. The financial resources of these stations, however, only covered the most necessary expenses.

Ten transmitters in the empire

716 1058 1058 1058 805 1112 530 1292 1373 1085 1382 662 770 1220 832 527 635 1319 1319 1319 563 1254 536 536 1157 941 923 1184 183.5

Map of the main and secondary stations in 1931 with frequencies

Logo of the Reichs-Rundfunk-Gesellschaft .

Broadcast participants in the course of 1925, broken down by station. The largest audience reaches Berlin, the smallest Königsberg. In the summer of 1925 a temporary saturation set in.

Space for antenna coils in the major radio station Nauen 1930

In 1924 further stations were opened:

• Frankfurt am Main I and
• Munich I (March 30th),
• Sender Hamburg I (May 2nd),
• Sender Stuttgart I (May 10th),
• Broadcaster Breslau I (May 26th),
• Sender Königsberg I (June 14th) and most recently the
• Sender Münster (October 10).

This happened out of a technical emergency: the transmission power of the transmitter in Königs Wusterhausen was not sufficient to supply the entire empire. Repeater transmitters were therefore required in the respective regions.

On January 1, 1925, the number of radio participants was 548,749; On May 15 of the same year, the Reichs-Rundfunk-Gesellschaft was created as a broadcasting umbrella organization under the leadership of the Reichspost . The radio makers soon discovered sport as an object of public interest. The first sports broadcast was a report on July 13, 1924 about a rowing competition on the Hamburg Alster . July 21, 1925 is considered to be the premiere for the first sports broadcast, where the reporter was not in the transmitter, but on-site at the action, namely at a rowing competition on the Dortmund-Ems Canal near Münster.

On November 1, 1925, Bernhard Ernst gave the first live commentary on a football match between Preußen Münster and Arminia Bielefeld on the radio. The first international soccer match that could be broadcast on the radio was the match between Germany and the Netherlands on April 18, 1926 in Düsseldorf . The Berlin radio tower was inaugurated on September 3, 1926 . Also in 1926, Deutsche Welle GmbH went on the air, which was later renamed Deutschlandender .

On the night of January 31st to February 1st, 1926, the first broadcast that interconnected all the channels in the Reich ran. The occasion was the liberation ceremony at Cologne Cathedral , the end of the first part of the Allied occupation of the Rhineland . The transmission ran over specially selected telephone lines. The coordinator was the recently established West German Broadcasting House.

As a radio device , the tube receiver with loudspeaker had replaced the simple detector apparatus with headphones from 1926 .

In 1927 the annual license fee was 24 marks. The Times of London writes in its October 6, 1927 issue (translated from English):

“This fee may seem high to English radio listeners, but the cost of the extensive German system is of course considerable. 'Rundfunkpiraten' or black listeners , as they are called in Germany, are numerous, but the authorities consider 2 Marks a month to be affordable and show little understanding for listeners who avoid paying. Figures published since 1926 show that up to the last quarter, an average of 500 people were convicted of this offense every three months. Last quarter, however, that number rose to 1003. In some cases prison sentences were imposed and in each case the receiving device was confiscated. "

The regional German broadcasters regularly published programs for 1932 at a price of between 25 and 90 pfennigs per month:

• Funkstunde , the official Berlin program sheet, Verlag Funk-Dienst Berlin
• WERAG , the announcement sheet for West German Broadcasting, Rufu-Verlag Cologne
• Mirag , the official program guide of the major broadcaster Leipzig, Mirag-Verlag Leipzig
• NORAG , for the northern German broadcasting district, Rufu-Verlag Hamburg
• Bavarian radio newspaper , for Bavaria and Palatinate, G. Franz'sche Buchdruckerei Munich
• SRZ , Südwestdeutsche Rundfunkzeitung, Südwestdeutscher Funk-Verlag Frankfurt
• Koenigsberger u. Danziger Rundfunk Illustrierte , for all of East Prussia, publishing house Königsberger and Danziger Rundfunk Königsberg
• Schlesische Funkstunde , official organ of the broadcasters Breslau and Gleiwitz, Schlesischer Funkverlag Breslau
• Südfunk with Süddeutscher Radio-Zeitung , for Württemberg and Baden, Tagblatt Stuttgart publishing house

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Radio theory and centralistic tendencies

In his writings, Bertolt Brecht developed an alternative concept to the broadcasting system established around 1925. In his radio experiment he tried to let the listener become an active player and thus to convert the asymmetrical flow of communication from transmitter to receiver into a symmetrical one. The entirety of these ideas is called Brecht's radio theory , although it is not a homogeneous structure. However, Brecht was aware that his idea "in this social order" was impracticable. He saw a political origin of the restrictions on radio: After the release of radio reception for everyone, the Reich Ministry of the Interior imposed various restrictions on industry:

• Only devices for receiving the wave range from 250 to 700 m (medium waves, 430 to 1200 kHz) were allowed to be manufactured.
• The receiving devices must not be able to generate radio waves themselves.
• Receiving devices were only allowed to be manufactured by officially recognized companies.

The state had thus achieved extensive control over the radio reception systems . In addition, there were content-related requirements for the broadcasters, whose programming was checked by committees with a control function. Political statements, eroticism and satire, among other things, were prohibited.

From 1928 onwards these requirements were gradually relaxed. At first, contributions on current topics of the time were allowed to be broadcast (e.g. economic boom, Reichswehr, alcohol abuse), then, under Brüning, occasional “statements from responsible statesmen” were added. This changed with the second broadcasting reform in 1932 . The von Papen government ("Cabinet of the Barons") made radio a state organ. The reorganization came from the Reich Ministry of the Interior and his radio advisor Erich Scholz. After this reform, additional "broadcasting commissioners" monitor the broadcasts. A large number of emergency ordinances generally extended state influence.

In March 1932, Reich President Hindenburg spoke in a half-hour broadcast throughout the German Reich

The Reichssendung was a radio broadcast that was broadcast from 1930 to 1945 on all radio stations in Germany. It was a mouthpiece with which the government addressed the population over the radio and thus the first instrument of clear political interference in the radio program. The first transmissions of this kind were usually every half hour, in the evening. In the German Reich under National Socialism , the Reich broadcasts were then only one of many radio propaganda channels for the regime. What the Reich broadcasts had in common was the interconnection of all transmitters in the Reich. The technology for this was tested from 1926 onwards via telephone lines and later via a radio cable system.

The central "guidelines for broadcasting" from 1932:

• The German radio serves the German people.
• The radio works with the life tasks of the German people.
• German broadcasting maintains Christian ethos and morals and respect for the honest convictions of those who think differently.
• The radio takes part in the great task of forming the Germans into the state people and of shaping and strengthening the state thinking and will of the listeners.
• The venerable forces and goods handed down from the past of the German people and the German Reich are to be respected and increased in the work of broadcasting.
• It is the task of all broadcasters to maintain the common and whole of the community of the German people. The regional broadcasters [...] also convey the rich life of the German tribes and landscapes.

The broadcasting companies were centralized and nationalized. The radio thus contained the basic patterns of the National Socialist propaganda apparatus.

The world broadcaster

→ Main article : World radio station

With good transmission quality, medium and long waves have a shorter range than short wave, which is subject to restrictions in the close range due to the propagation of sky waves. This is why shortwave was only of interest to international broadcasters . In Germany, development began a little later than in Great Britain, the Netherlands and the USA. On August 26, 1929 at 12 noon, the overseas program called " World Broadcasting " by the Reich Ministry of Post of the Weimar Republic began .

The world broadcasting station was the first state shortwave transmitter in Germany. The Federal Republic of Germany Deutsche Welle sees itself in its tradition. It transmitted on the frequency 9560 kHz (wavelength 31.38 m) from Zeesen near Königs Wusterhausen in the immediate vicinity of the German transmitter and reached almost all parts of the world. Because of its negligible reception at home, it took some time before the station was also noticed within the empire. Abroad, on the other hand, German emigrants in America especially valued him immediately after his start.

In 1932 the world broadcasting station was so well established that the German hour could be received every two weeks via the NBC network all over the USA. German researchers and politicians spoke here in English; first the director of the Berlin School of Politics, Ernst Jäckh , then the head of the Berlin Charité Ferdinand Sauerbruch , the Nobel laureate in chemistry, Friedrich Bergius , the industrialists Carl Friedrich von Siemens , Fritz Thyssen , Chancellor Heinrich Brüning and many others.

From April 1, 1933, the National Socialists instrumentalized the world radio station for their propaganda purposes and called it the "German short-wave transmitter".

National Socialist Propaganda Instrument

Preparing to take over broadcasting

"Funk-Pillory" column in the Nazi radio magazine " Der Deutsche Sender " (issue 12, 1932)

In 1930, in his speech at the opening of the German Radio Exhibition in Berlin, Albert Einstein declared : “It is only technicians that make true democracy possible” and “Radio has a unique function to fulfill: the reconciliation of peoples.” But a few years later the NS Regime governing power in the German Reich.

Even before the seizure of power by the Nazis prepared in the Weimar Republic , the Papen before a state based broadcasting doctrine. On the radio program “Hour of the Reich Government” in June 1932, Reich Interior Minister Wilhelm von Gayl announced this demand to broadcasters:

“The Reich government attaches importance to communicating its intentions and actions to the German people directly by using the modern radio equipment. We feel obliged to turn to the millions of German people who listen to the radio in all parts of our fatherland. From now on we will speak directly to the German people through the radio so that they know what it is about and because they have a right to hear us! "

The National Socialists discovered and used the mass media for their own purposes at an early stage. In order to gain influence on radio in Germany at an early stage, they infiltrated the Reich Association of German Radio Participants (RDR) as early as the late 1920s and in 1930 created the propaganda organ " Der Deutsche Sender ", a radio magazine that supported the existing radio system with anti-Semitic and anti-democratic statements attack and defamed its operator. In addition, the NSDAP set up a network of so-called “radio control rooms” throughout the Reich - experts who knew their way around radio technology and who gave free on-site support with reception problems. Many radio control rooms were close to the broadcasters and supplied internal information to the party; in any case, they were busy radio listeners with a good overview of the current program. It was thanks to them that “Der Deutsche Sender” was usually exceptionally up-to-date and precisely informed and that, in its “Der Funk-Panger” section, it was able to accuse the German broadcast elite specifically of partiality and “Jewish-Marxist” tendencies on individual programs.

1933: German radio pioneers, SPD functionaries in Oranienburg concentration camp

The tone of this magazine, which was drastically tightened in 1932, as well as defamatory, mostly personal attacks on individual directors in other NSDAP-controlled papers such as the " Westdeutsche Beobachter " prepared the ground for the fact that, within a few weeks of Hitler's seizure of power, Goebbels' propaganda ministry opposed most of the radio officials Was able to exchange editors and directors loyal to the Nazi regime the old squad was partially tried. Hans Flesch , Alfred Braun , Ernst Hardt - as well as numerous other radio pioneers - were arrested and taken to concentration camps . On September 30, 1933, the radio, which has meanwhile been synchronized, reported in detail about the Oranienburg camp in a sound recording, which was presumably only broadcast on shortwave for foreign countries and Germans abroad. It is the only surviving Nazi radio coverage of a concentration camp.

Radio address, February 1, 1933, Hitler

1935: Shops close so that a speech by Hitler can be heard

With the slogan "The whole of Germany will hear the leader with the peopleâ" the government marketed the Volksempfänger VE 301. Its model designation was derived from the date of the Nazi seizure of power from (301 = January 30 [1933]). The number of listeners rose from around four million at the beginning of 1932 to over 12 million in mid-1939. Despite this success, radio reception density in Germany in 1934 was only 33.3% (46.9% in 1937) and thus far below that in the USA (78 , 3%) and Great Britain (66.1%).

In 1933, the Gestapo began to deport radio participants who were assigned to the communists and who had jointly received “ Radio Moscow ” to concentration camps. Higher regional courts, special courts and the People's Court had already passed judgments for “preparation for high treason ” without a legal basis because the accused had listened to this station. Since October 29, 1929, Radio Moscow, a powerful shortwave broadcaster of the Central Council of Soviet Trade Unions, has broadcast German-language programs that support the KPD in Germany with propaganda. From 1931 onwards, the Reich government tried to use numerous jammers against this, but these led to unpleasant interference from the German transmitter during operation .

In September 1933, the Gestapo issued a decree that all persons found during the collective reception of "Radio Moscow" were to be sent to a concentration camp immediately . Technical changes to radio receivers were considered to prevent reception.

With an ordinance on extraordinary broadcasting measures of September 1, 1939 , the day the attack on Poland began , the spreading of news from bugged enemy broadcasters was made a punishable offense in the German Reich . Listening to radio stations from neutral countries allied with Germany was also prohibited. In National Socialist Germany, both were also referred to as broadcasting crime.

Takeover of broadcasting by the Propaganda Ministry

Radio program of the German "Reichssender" and the Deutschlandsender on February 28, 1936

Distribution of people's receivers in 1938 on the occasion of Goebbels' 41st birthday in the Berliner Funkhaus by Gau propaganda leader Werner Wächter (with swastika armband ) to “needy people”.

Soon after the seizure of power in 1933, all broadcasting companies had to surrender their shares in the Reichs-Rundfunk-Gesellschaft (RRG) to the Reich Ministry for Public Enlightenment and Propaganda , headed by Joseph Goebbels , which also took over all sovereign administrative rights from the Reichspost. The broadcasters became branches of the RRG and thus an instrument of the Propaganda Ministry. Radio was completely nationalized and became one of the most important parts of Nazi propaganda . As early as the summer of 1933, the broadcasting world was completely different from the ten years before. The sale of radio receivers was massively promoted by the state. a. via the electricity supply company with the option of payment in installments. This change found its most obvious expression in the mass distribution of the “ people's receivers ”. The National Socialists advertised these newly constructed types of inexpensive receivers with the slogan: “All of Germany hears the Führer with the people's receiver”.

For example, on August 23, 1933 , the Nazi newspaper “ Westdeutscher Beobachter ” devoted a lot of space to broadcasting, this time with the program: “300,000 Cologne residents are to become radio participants. First effects of the new radio policy. Cologne receives a broadcast advice center. Large radio campaign of the radio chamber to increase the number of listeners. The role of the new popular receiver. Scheduled recruitment of new radio listeners. ”The staff for the radio advice center, which has an impact“ right down to the smallest village ”, was provided by the radio control room with their technical expertise. The consultants were not allowed to sell ("to mess with the radio trade") - it was a punishable offense; but they were probably active in buying advice and were encouraged to make it possible for those with poor means to purchase a receiver.

In order to bring broadcasting to the party line, waves of layoffs took place in the broadcasting houses between March and June 1933, affecting not only the management staff and editorial offices, but also the technology and administration of the broadcasters. The government provided the newly appointed Intendant for these measures with “commissioners for special use”, whose head (“department for special use”) was Weltziens. One of the commission questionnaires commissioned by the Propaganda Ministry, which Weltziens distributed to employees of the radio stations on May 27, 1933, has been preserved. The central questions were whether the radio employees had already become members of the NSDAP before January 30 or only afterwards and whether and when they had served the SA and the Hitler Youth. The journalist and songwriter Jochen Klepper , who works for Berliner Rundfunk , wrote in his diary on March 8th that the swastika flag had been affixed to the radio building , and on March 30th, 1933 about the disabilities in a radio play production:

“I finished writing 'Atlantis' on time. Now it was time to rehearse things quickly for Saturday. The rehearsal had to fail. The manuscript had not been copied because the company that Funk has been working with so far is Jewish. The records I ordered were withdrawn from me because either the company or the composer (I needed: 'Sea calm and happy voyage') or the conductor is Jewish. I had to send my most reliable spokesman away because he is Jewish. And besides, the radio is almost like a National Socialist barracks: uniforms, uniforms of the party formations. "

- Jochen Klepper : Diary

The German shortwave transmitter

→ Main article : German shortwave transmitter

The fact that radio became an exclusive instrument of the Goebbels Ministry was controversial within the Hitler government. Already at the beginning of 1933 there was a dispute between Propaganda Minister Goebbels and the Prussian State Minister Hermann Göring . Goering did not want to hand over the foreign propaganda to Goebbels, Hitler decided against Going on May 24th.

Goebbels not only rebuilt the domestic broadcasters, but brought in the Munich broadcast director Kurt von Boeckmann to convert and expand the German shortwave broadcasting station in Berlin in the National Socialist sense. Von Boeckmann became head of the foreign department in the Reichsendeleitung and thus belonged to the top management of the World Broadcasting Association. The short wave started on April 1, 1933 from a private villa near the Berlin radio station on Masurenallee with a staff of seven (1935: 51 employees, 1938: 242 employees). For the Olympic Winter Games in 1936 , the transmission capacities via the antennas in Königs Wusterhausen were greatly expanded. In addition to the existing shortwave transmitters with 5 kW, 8 kW and 13 kW output, eight more with a transmission output of 40 kW and twelve directional radiators for particularly long ranges were added in 1935 and 1936. Half of the new transmission capacity was used for normal radio operations in distant countries, especially the USA, and the other half for international program exchange. In terms of broadcasting technology, Germany was at the top of the world. A little later, Göring made up for some of his power-political defeats at radio in the struggle for influence on television.

The numerous radio amateurs contributed to the success of the first shortwave broadcasts in the mid-1920s . They ran many tests that the industry used. The strict regulation of broadcasting in Germany ran counter to amateur radio, especially that which dealt with long-range shortwave. On November 24, 1937, the Reich Ministry of Justice drastically tightened the “law against black transmitters”: “From now on black broadcasts will be punished with penal prison” and no longer with prison, wrote the engineer Fritz W. Behn at the beginning of his book on the construction of shortwave transmitters. According to the new legal situation, even those who tinkered with such a transmitter or kept it came to prison and their equipment was confiscated. In order to give his electrotechnical textbook with detailed construction instructions an appropriately deterrent tone, Behn warned:

“It is irrelevant whether individual parts or connections of the transmitter are still missing or have been removed. So excuses that the transmitter is not finished and not operational are useless. Also [...] wave meters that emit electrical vibrations fall under the term 'radio transmission systems'. The Deutsche Reichspost only grants broadcasting permits to radio enthusiasts who are members of the […] German Amateur Broadcasting and Receiving Service e. V., Berlin-Dahlem, Cecilienallee 4 [are]. "

Synchronization and Großdeutscher Rundfunk

Newspaper clipping from the West German Observer : The New Broadcasting Policy under the Nazis (August 1933)

Radio was nationalized under the National Socialists. The eleven independent broadcasting companies that had existed up to then were dissolved, reclassified into Reich broadcasters and subordinated to the Reich Ministry for Public Enlightenment and Propaganda . Jewish, social democratic and communist employees are dismissed through personal “purges”. On March 25, 1933, Goebbels asked the directors of the broadcasting corporations to carry out this “cleaning act” themselves: “But if you don't do that or if you don't want to, we will do it.” Three months later, all but one of the directors the NSDAP member also loses their post. A prerequisite for working at radio for journalists is a member of the Reich Broadcasting Chamber - a department of the Reich Chamber of Culture . Goebbels determines the criteria for this.

From an organizational point of view , the broadcasting sector was brought into line with the establishment of the Reichsrundfunkkammer , which was dissolved again in 1939, with its competencies being transferred to the Reichs-Rundfunk-Gesellschaft (RRG), which also carried out the microphone aptitude test required from 1938 to participate in broadcast productions. The programs were unilaterally politicized by broadcasting the speeches of the “Führer” and other Nazi celebrities. The choice of music concentrated on German light music, while marching music only made up a small proportion. From 1935 z. B. Jazz prohibited as " degenerate music ". Listening to the radio was declared a state-political duty, which further promoted sales of VE 301 and DKE 1938.

The restructuring plans took shape shortly after Hitler came to power . Due to the rapid increase in radio subscribers (4.3 million on January 1, 1933, 5 million on January 1, 1934) the revenue from fees rose proportionally. The Reichspost used only a fraction of its income from this source to set up and maintain a broadcasting infrastructure, which is why Goebbels withdrew large parts of the budget from it in mid-1933 and redirected it to finance his own ministry. Against resistance from the Post Office under Eltz von Rübenach , greater resistance from the Finance Ministry and Hitler's assessment that a Propaganda Ministry only needed a small budget, Goebbels and his department head Erich Greiner succeeded in 1934 in bringing all income from broadcasting fees under their control. The Goebbels Ministry only paid the Reichspost and the Reichs-Rundfunk-Gesellschaft, as stated in the budget, "severance payments". Over the years, the severance payment for the Reichs-Rundfunk-Gesellschaft steadily decreased. While it was still 32.5% of all fee income in 1933/34, it fell to 19.1% in 1939/40. The funding requirements of the Propaganda Ministry rose so strongly that after 1933 nothing was heard of the populist election promise made by the National Socialists before the seizure of power to reduce radio license fees. Goebbels justified the handling of fees by saying at the opening of the 12th Great German Radio Exhibition that the Propaganda Ministry “subsidizes German cultural life in all its branches”.

At the radio exhibition a year later, in August 1936, Goebbels gave a keynote address on the content of the radio program: “The radio program must be designed in such a way that the spoiled taste is still interested and the undemanding still appears pleasant and understandable. Particular attention should be paid to relaxation and entertainment [...]. In contrast, the few who only want to be nourished by Kant and Hegel hardly matter. "

The British press took the restructuring of broadcasting in Germany very critically at an early stage. The Times ran the headline on February 20, 1935: "Broadcasting in Germany - The Nazi Machine - Propaganda at home and abroad". In the article, the correspondent rates Germany as the most developed broadcasting country in Europe. The Reich operates its seven most powerful transmitters at the internationally permitted limit of 100 kW each; the German broadcaster with 60 kW over long wave doubled its output to 120 kW. The Times mentions West Germany as an example of the “excellent” coverage , where two 100 kW transmitters in Langenberg and Mühlacker would be flanked by weaker transmitters in Frankfurt, Freiburg, Kaiserslautern, Trier and Koblenz. Politically, the newspaper came to the conclusion:

“German and British radio are organized differently. All German radio systems belong to the post office. Their programs are provided by the Reichs-Rundfunk-Gesellschaft, which belongs to the German Reich and is provided by Propaganda Minister Dr. Goebbels is controlled. He appoints and dismisses the directors of the RRG and the directors of the regional broadcasters who are responsible for the non-political regional programs. Political broadcasts are controlled directly from Berlin. So the broadcasting machine is in the hands of the government. "

- The Times : Broadcasting in Germany. The Nazi Machine. Propaganda at Home and Abroad. February 20, 1935. Translated from English

In the same article, the Times correctly describes the strict coupling of broadcasting to the Nazi party NSDAP , right across the party hierarchy: A Gaufunkwart belonged to each of the 38 Reichsgaue . These were subordinated to about 1,000 county radio observatory and a radio Wart in every major city. When important political radio speeches were due, the radio control room had to ensure that appropriate loudspeaker systems were set up in every factory, every school and every major square. The Gaufunkwart was in contact with the listener base through his subordinate radio attendants and at the same time had direct access to the directors of the respective country broadcasters and was able to “exercise his influence so that the radio listeners get to hear the program what they really want.” The national broadcasters had every possibility of designing the content taken for the program; they were an instrument of mass taste for entertainment and the propaganda interests of the political elite.

Goebbels introduced the term Großdeutscher Rundfunk for the Reichsrundfunk on January 1, 1939 . From June 1940 this broadcast a National Socialist standard program for the entire German Reich. One example of the program are the Christmas ring broadcasts from 1940 to 1943 on the “connection between the front and home”.

People's Receiver

→ Main article : Volksempfänger

People's receiver, type VE301W

Joseph Goebbels in front of the Volksempfänger for RM 65.00, right Reichsrundfunkkammer -President Hans Kriegler , radio exhibition on August 5, 1938

The industrial mass production of radio sets began with the series production of the VE 301 popular receivers . Its type designation was derived from the date of the National Socialist seizure of power (301 = January 30 [1933]). From May 25, 1933, 100,000 VE 301 were produced for 76  Reichsmarks (RM) each; At the end of 1933 the production number reached 500,000, and in 1935 it finally reached 1.3 million. By 1937 the price had dropped to RM 59. The VE 301 was only designed for medium and long wave , listening to short wave radio was not possible with them. Since the VE not 301 Cost considerations superheterodyne receiver were designed (superheterodyne), even distant foreign stations were poorly received.

After the success of the Volksempfänger, a technically even further simplified version was also offered from 1938 at a price of 35 RM, the DKE 1938 ( Deutscher Kleinempfänger ), popularly known as the "Goebbels-Schnauze". The third device was the DAF 1011 ( German Labor Front Receiver ) for the communal reception ordered in factories and factories. Here, too, the type designation stands for a politically significant date: On November 10, 1933, Adolf Hitler spoke at the Siemens-Schuckert plant in Spandau to convince the workers of the referendum against the “Dictate of Versailles” scheduled for November 12, and with it To vote for new elections for the Reichstag.

In 1936 another device came onto the market, the German Olympic case , a portable case device equipped with batteries for receiving outdoors. The occasion was the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin, which was broadcast on radio for the first time worldwide. The device emerged from a competition initiated by the German Broadcasting Wholesaler (WDRG). The Olympic suitcase receiver was publicly advertised from 1936 as a “portable receiver for travel, weekend and sport”. "As part of the 'fight against the summer handset acceptance' and to advertise the suitcase device (especially the German Olympic suitcase)", the Reichsrundfunkkammer published a poster in 1938 with an image of the device in an edition of 70,000.

In 1936 the National Socialists stopped broadcasting commercial advertisements .

The production of the VE 301 and the DKE in 1938 meant that the number of listeners rose from around four million in early 1932 to over 12 million in mid-1939. However, it is still a historical legend that the National Socialists achieved a particularly high reception density by promoting the spread of radio receivers: the radio reception density in Germany was 33.3% in 1934 and rose to 46.9% by 1937. In the USA in 1937 the reception density was already 78.3% in 1937 and in Great Britain 66.1%. In the German Reich a comparable value of 65% was not reached until 1941.

The trade journal Der Radio-Händler recorded sales of 91,940 people's receivers in the last quarter of 1936, a year later it was 164,344. Because the number of registered listeners rose by 365,331 during the same period, the magazine concluded that around half of the new customers bought “community receivers” and the other half bought branded devices. At that time, it was assumed that radio receivers would have a service life of eight years; Converted to around ten million listeners, this means: "1,250,000 devices per year that have to be replaced as they are out of date."

Second World War

As German cities were increasingly bombed by Allied planes, the radio became an important civil defense instrument: a signal - the so-called “cuckoo call” - was used to warn of the approaching enemy bomber squadrons.

Listening to enemy stations is prohibited

Listening to enemy stations is prohibited

On August 31, 1939, a fictitious attack by a German SS commando in captured uniforms of the Polish army took place on the Gleiwitz secondary transmitter to provide a pretext for the attack on Poland . With the “ Ordinance on Extraordinary Broadcasting Measures ” of September 1, 1939, listening to and broadcasting news from foreign stations (so-called enemy broadcasters ) as “crimes against the national security of our people” (broadcasting crimes) was made subject to heavy penalties during World War II . Listening to radio stations from neutral countries allied with Germany was also prohibited. In mid-1941 there was the first death sentence for listening to foreign radio stations. The radio was described as "the youngest child of our war technology"; the Allies used the radio for "counter-propaganda".

Expansion of international broadcasting

The German shortwave broadcaster KWS, which broadcasts abroad , relied on more and more words in its program from the beginning of the war. In 1938 60% of the broadcasting route was still equipped with music, in 1943 it was only 46% and in 1944 30%. News came first, followed by comments, which at the time were called “talks” in German radio-internal parlance. While the domestic program stopped producing lavish programs, especially radio plays and new music recordings, during the war , the shortwave editors produced radio plays under the head dramaturge Willi Schäferdiek and music under the head of music at KWS Walter Jentsch - albeit in small quantities. When selecting music, the foreign language programs allowed themselves to go on excursions to the "hot music" (especially jazz) that Goebbels had banned from domestic radio but which he considered necessary for international radio. The German-language programs abroad ran at KWS under the name Deutsche Zone and, among other things, produced longer reports several times a week called "Features" with a large number of freelance workers. The fee for these reporters ranged from 20 Reichsmarks for three minutes to 240 RM for 60 minutes of reporting. Often these productions were later adopted in the programs of the Reich broadcasters, also thanks to improved recording options on vinyl (instead of wax) and magnetic tape. The mailing of letters deteriorated during the war, so that the KWS increasingly sent personal greetings. The most popular of these popular international programs were Blinkfeuer Heimat and Ankerspill .

During the war, a new genre of news emerged, the special message (a form of breaking news ). It was always a success story and was announced with drum rolls and fanfares. The composition of the fanfare already gave indications of the combat area. Minutes before the special report went over the transmitter, it was with the slogan “Attention, attention! We will bring a special report shortly! ”Announced and gave the listeners time to gather around the radio receivers.

The Propaganda Ministry held daily conferences with the heads of the press, including radio, in order to maintain conformity. In addition, the program makers often received messages during the day with the comment “On a higher request” or “On a very special request”. She did not know who was expressing these wishes, only that they came from the Propaganda Ministry or the Foreign Office (which chronically argued over competence in matters of broadcasting).

At the beginning of 1943, the German shortwave transmitter was renamed Die Deutschen Überseesender , but remained the "KWS" in common parlance. The reason for the renaming was the official structure of the German European broadcasters via medium and short wave; In reality, the European broadcasters aimed at neighboring European countries had already been set up at the beginning of the war. From the beginning, Walter Kamm was its director, broadcasting director and later director. The German European broadcasters were divided into six country groups and most recently broadcast programs in 29 languages. The Ministry of Propaganda, coordinated by the "Foreign Director" of the Reichs-Rundfunkgesellschaft Anton Winkelnkemper in close coordination with Goebbels, radiated 147 hours of foreign programming daily in 53 languages ​​into the world.

Short wave leaves Berlin

Because of the increasing Allied air raids on Berlin , the shortwave transmitter moved to the countryside in Königs Wusterhausen in August 1943 in the immediate vicinity of the transmitter. Intendancy and broadcasting management were housed in the station hotel, the editors and technicians had three sound storage rooms (small studios, mainly for sound editing). The broadcast studios themselves were in the basement of the post office. The relocation to Königs Wusterhausen resulted in several postponements. For example, the visually impaired had to move from the home for the blind to the “ Brandenburg State Lunatic Asylum ” in Teupitz so that around 80 shortwave radio employees could move into the home for the blind. The whole area was occupied by employees of the international broadcaster, for example the Deutsche Zone editorial team worked in the Gussow inn, the head of the international broadcaster Winkelnkemper moved into Schenkendorf Castle. A few weeks after the move, Allied bombers destroyed the entire area of ​​the short-wave transmitter in Berlin in November 1943. The foreign program from Königs Wusterhausen had to be drastically reduced because of the primitive technology and the increasingly poor connection to Berlin (where employees stayed with their families due to the war or couriers with records never arrived in Königs Wusterhausen). In-house productions hardly took place any more, most of the program was taken over by the Reich broadcasters. Alternative points were created in Helmstedt (for shipments to India and the Middle East, in the basement of the Hotel Pätzold) and in Landshut (for Asia, in the dance hall of the “Goldene Sonne” inn). On April 25, 1945, the last technician cleared the facilities in Königs Wusterhausen for fear of the advancing Red Army. The management staff (Winkelnkemper, Cleinow and the later Chancellor Kiesinger ) tried to make their way to Landshut, but never got there. At the end of April 1945, the "Golden Sun Sender" also stopped its program.

Secret transmitter

The international channels also included countless "secret channels", some of which were only used briefly. Erich Hetzler was in the Foreign Ministry. From April 1941 on, Hetzler was only responsible for these camouflaged transmitters as "broadcasting manager with special tasks" , which acted as if they were not operated by Germany and the National Socialists. They were all grouped under the name Concordia . The longest-lived variants included the three shortwave transmitters aimed at England, New British Broadcasting Station (NBBS, known as the " Loch Lomond " transmitter), Caledonia and Worker's Challenge . While the NBBS combined national dissolution propaganda with a pacifist undertone, Caledonia turned primarily to Scottish nationalists. Worker's Challenge specifically addressed workers with a social revolutionary undertone in the London dialect Cockney . The secret broadcasters could also operate on the move, such as - allegedly successful - in Hitler's campaign in France , when an apparently French, but in reality German broadcasters near the front played happy chansons, with appeals interspersed not to shed unnecessary blood, but rather the fighting for peace Will cease. The program ended with the words: “Bonne nuit, les gars. À bientôt! "(Good night, guys. See you soon!)

From 1943 onwards, the Allies also increasingly built up German-language camouflage broadcasters that pretended to be German foreign broadcasters. For example, the soldier's channel Calais, operated by the British secret service, broadcast messages over medium waves that degrade the military ; its shortwave counterpart aimed at German submarines was called the shortwave transmitter Atlantic . The speakers spoke German without an accent and, as a rule, never attacked the German leadership elite directly, in order not to make themselves suspicious.

On September 1, 1944, a Führer decree "on total war effort " had closed all cultural institutions such as theaters , exhibitions , and art schools, among others. Only film and radio should "give the soldiers at the front and the creative homeland relaxation and [to] convey cultural values".

The last remaining intact Reichsender Flensburg announced the end of the Second World War in Europe for the first time from the German side on May 7, 1945 at 12:45 p.m. with a speech by Lutz von Schwerin-Krosigk on behalf of the executive government . The unconditional surrender of the Wehrmacht was to come into force for all fronts on May 8th at 11:01 p.m. Central European time . This date, on which the war in Europe ended, is celebrated as “ Liberation Day ” or “ VE Day ”.

post war period

Re-establishment of broadcasting by the Allies

Before the end of the war, the Western Allies had far less concrete ideas about the change in the German media landscape than the Soviet side. The Soviets began early to train German communists in exile as cadre for building media. Since July 1943 they operated radio stations in the Soviet Union, which were initially intended primarily as a means of psychological warfare against the Wehrmacht.

In 1943 the British and Americans decided to peacefully integrate post-war Germany as a democratic state in Europe and to win the population over to this approach. In October 1943, the European Advisory Commission was founded together with the Soviet Union . She made the first general plans for the German media landscape after the war. However, their proposals were initially aimed primarily at the press. In April 1944, the Psychological Warfare Division took over the preparation of specific projects. According to her, a central allied commission should jointly and nationwide determine media policy. Concrete guidelines for media policy were presented on April 16, 1945 in the "Handbook for the Control of German Information Services".

The “Handbook” also dealt primarily with the reorganization of the press, but at least contained an initial strategy for broadcasting. Special units were to occupy radio stations and editorial offices and immediately begin broadcasting an Allied program. This should be produced by Radio Luxemburg , enriched by BBC and Voice of America productions. The programs were primarily intended to provide information to the population and to promote re-education. After the occupation of the whole of Germany, it was planned to set up a central and joint propaganda center for the Allies in Berlin with an associated “national broadcasting service”. In order to eliminate the Nazi influence, all journalists who had worked in Germany since 1933 were to be banned from their profession, with a few exceptions. In the “Handbook”, however, specifications for the transition of broadcasting to Germans were completely missing, while they were available for the press ( licensed press ). There were only general suggestions for decentralized broadcasting beyond government control.

The British were the first to start broadcasting a radio program in Hamburg on May 4, 1945, other occupying powers followed quickly, the French not until October in Koblenz . The Allies had to make use of the existing broadcasting infrastructure, whereby the occupation zones and old German structures were superimposed. The broadcast crews began contrary to planning immediately to build an independent word and music programs, soon mastered a daily transmission mode and set the time being the only daily medium. The British accepted this condition as first and already decided in late summer 1945, the new North West German Broadcasting to a to expand an independent full program. In late autumn 1945 there was a full program in each of the occupation zones. The Americans quickly added several smaller, regional channels. Deviating from the original plan, the Allies began hiring a rapidly growing number of German employees after the Potsdam Conference at the latest . Only the Americans closely monitored the radio. The British and French gave their employees a relatively free hand.

The new transmission system of the Berliner Rundfunk in Königs Wusterhausen (1949)

The " Haus des Rundfunks " occupied by the Red Army in Masurenallee in Berlin (from July 1945 British sector), later the seat of the broadcaster Free Berlin (SFB), became under the control of the Soviet Military Administration (SMAD) on May 13, 1945 the first radio broadcast of the " Berliner Rundfunks ", the future radio of the GDR , broadcast. KP functionary Hans Mahle , who belongs to the Ulbricht group, was responsible for the program . The former broadcaster with nationwide broadcasting capacity was shut down and was in Soviet hands. The SMAD rejected the implementation of the plans from the PWD handbook for joint use. The Berliner Rundfunk was oriented more and more communist until the end of 1945 and was distributed further via the stronger transmitter Königs Wusterhausen . As a countermeasure, the Americans initially launched a wireless service and, from September 1946, launched “Broadcasting in the American Sector” ( RIAS ). In August 1946, the British military government in Berlin put a relay transmitter into operation for the Nordwestdeutscher Rundfunk Hamburg (NWDR) transmitter located in the British occupation zone .

Different developments in the zones of occupation

841 564 1231 785 1465 1303 1031 686 629 527 1438 1402 1258 574 740 950 1330 904 904 1330 1330 1330 1031 530 827 827 827 1267

Map of the main and secondary channels 1949 BR SDR HR RB RIAS BeRu MDR NWDR SWF SR

The long-term broadcasting regulations also went different ways in the zones. As early as December 1945, the Soviets handed over the radio administration to an authority close to the KPD , which, however, remained dependent on instructions from the SMAD. Radio was to be organized by the state based on the Soviet model. State broadcasters were established by the end of 1946, but they were only allowed to design individual program niches. There was no federalization. With the establishment of the GDR , broadcasting was completely transferred to state organs.

The British occupation administration gradually transferred more competencies to the German employees of the NWDR. The German service of the BBC took over the task of re-education and propaganda against the Soviets from November 1945. This gave the broadcaster Hamburg more freedom to design programs. The NWDR should provide a strong counterbalance to any communist takeover of all German broadcasting. However, the station was in conflict with the traditional federal broadcasting structure and sparked protests, especially in North Rhine-Westphalia . In the course of 1946, the British developed a structure for broadcasting in the German administration: financing was to be provided through fees, and the board of directors was to form a powerful control body with representatives of all social groups. The technical equipment should become the property of the sender to prevent control by the central post office. In 1947, the British administration granted the German parties greater powers in filling the board of directors under massive pressure. This new broadcasting system officially came into effect in 1948.

The Americans quickly built a decentralized broadcasting structure and, after the formation of the German states, negotiated with the state governments to take over broadcasting sovereignty. These talks did not lead to any results because, from the point of view of the occupation administration, the Länder demanded too much influence. In late 1947 the Americans decided to adopt the British system. However, the parties had less influence in the broadcasting councils of the American zone. The broadcasting councils themselves were given even more extensive competencies in planning programs and choosing the artistic director than the British.

The French were slow to set up their own zone broadcasting due to technical problems. They created the SWF as a unified transmitter with small regional sections for their comparatively small zone of occupation. A full program was only broadcast in March 1946. Germans were in management positions from the start. A re-education assignment was almost not implemented in the program at all. The French did not initially intend to let the SWF pass completely into German sovereignty, but from 1948 onwards they were pressured by the British and Americans to adopt their approach. In October 1948, the SWF received autonomy based on the US model, but until 1952 the occupation authorities had extensive opportunities to intervene.

Broadcasting in the GDR

→ Main article : Broadcasting of the GDR

"This is where Berlin speaks"

The new broadcasting house in East Berlin, built in 1954 for the German broadcaster

The first broadcast on the territory of the Soviet occupation zone was broadcast on May 13, 1945. "Here speaks Berlin" was the acoustic signet. The communist Hans Mahle was one of the founders of the GDR radio . In the same year, regional broadcasters began operating under Soviet control , including Radio Leipzig , which later became the GDR's Mitteldeutsche Rundfunk . Even before the GDR was founded, the German broadcaster began operating on May 1, 1949 . The Deutschlandsender was intended as the socialist radio organ for all of Germany.

On September 4, 1954, the GDR radio moved from the West Berlin House of Broadcasting to a new building in the East Berlin district of Oberschöneweide , the Funkhaus Nalepastraße . Here the programs for the local GDR channels were produced centrally. The state broadcasters only delivered regional reporting to the main program or provided niches such as Radio DDR II , the trade fair wave in Leipzig or the Radio GDR holiday wave for holidaymakers in the Baltic Sea. Radio Berlin International (RBI) was founded in 1959 as a purely international broadcaster with programs in foreign languages . Like its western counterpart, Deutsche Welle , RBI did not broadcast domestically, i.e. not via VHF .

From the founding of the GDR in 1949 until the end of 1990, the State Committee for Broadcasting , established on the basis of the Soviet model, was responsible for broadcasting .

1960 until the collapse

"25 Years of German Democratic Broadcasting". GDR postage stamp from 1970

Immediately after the Wall was built , a Cold War of radio waves began in 1961 . GDR citizens with west facing roof antennas had to expect sanctions. The GDR radio started - like the other way around also West stations - the jamming of frequencies of "hostile" radio, especially the RIAS broadcasting from West Berlin . In 1971 the state broadcasting committee merged the German broadcaster and the Berliner Welle , which was limited to Berlin , and created the voice of the GDR .

In 1986, the youth radio program DT64 , which was founded in the 1960s, was expanded into its own transmitter. DT64 addressed in a non-state-supporting way the feeling of the beat generation and thus the protest of the citizens against their state. DT64 was already broadcasting “Westmusik” in the 1970s, when it was still aggressively classified as “revisionist” and decadent by the state party SED .

After the political change in 1989

16 mm film from GDR television in a chilled film can in the DRA Potsdam

After the collapse of the GDR , the GDR radio was dismantled and new transmitters built according to the western model: Antenne Brandenburg , Sachsen Radio , Thüringen 1 and Radio Sachsen-Anhalt . The national broadcaster “Voice of the GDR” was renamed “Deutschlandsender” again on February 12, 1990, and shortly afterwards it merged with Radio DDR II in Deutschlandsender Kultur (DS Kultur). On December 31, 1991, the transition to public law structures was over. The national broadcasters of the former GDR incorporated the ARD . The frequencies of the international broadcaster RBI took over on October 3, 1990 the Deutsche Welle broadcasting from Cologne. From DS Kultur and RIAS, the "DeutschlandRadio Berlin" emerged on January 1st, 1994, with its seat in the former RIAS broadcasting house on Hans-Rosenthal- Platz in Berlin-Schöneberg. DeutschlandRadio Berlin later became the sister station of Deutschlandfunk , Deutschlandradio Kultur .

The archive material of GDR radio - as well as television - is administered by the German Broadcasting Archive (DRA) at the Babelsberg location .

Broadcasting in the Federal Republic of Germany

Establishment of regulated broadcasting operations

Radio scale of a tube receiver from 1952

In West Germany were from 1948 to 1949 by the country's broadcasting laws of the Bayerischer Rundfunk , the Hessian Radio , Radio Bremen and the Süddeutsche Rundfunk founded. In 1950 all state broadcasting corporations merged to form the working group of the public broadcasting corporations of the Federal Republic of Germany ( ARD ). Since Germany received only a few medium wave frequencies under the Copenhagen Wave Plan - which, unlike in other large European countries, had to be distributed among several regional broadcasters - the broadcasters also began to push ahead with the expansion of the VHF network.

The first regular television program of the post-war period was broadcast in September 1951 by the Grundig company station in Fürth . From Christmas 1952, the NWDR broadcast its program, which is considered to be the actual restart of television in Germany. In February 1956 the radio of the GDR opened a new radio house, the radio house Nalepastraße in Berlin-Oberschöneweide, from which East Germany was centrally supplied with radio broadcasts.

On May 3, 1953, Deutsche Welle began broadcasting on shortwave as an international broadcaster for the Federal Republic of Germany, initially under the responsibility of the NWDR and later of the WDR . For a short time, broadcasting was expanded to include many foreign languages, and by law of November 29, 1960, Deutsche Welle became an independent federal agency under public law ( broadcasting corporation ) based in Cologne .

In the post-war period, broadcasters in Germany made a name for themselves as promoters of culture, especially in the fields of literature and classical music. In the 1950s and 1960s, for example, many writers were able to earn a living by reading and writing radio plays . In addition to the large radio symphony orchestras such as the RSO Frankfurt with its range of classical music, ARD also specifically promoted modern styles such as jazz and electronic music .

The 1960s to 1980s

On January 1, 1962, Deutschlandfunk, founded in 1960 by federal law, began broadcasting on long and medium wave with an information program that could be received in large parts of Europe. The target group of the program were primarily the listeners in the GDR and - with the foreign language broadcasts later recorded on medium wave - Eastern Europe, it practically formed the counterpart to the Deutschlandsender , the radio program of the radio of the GDR .

In the 1960s up to and including the 1980s, the public broadcasting corporations in West Germany and the state radio of the GDR in East Germany had a monopoly position.

The cultural commitment of the ARD broadcasters was not expanded further in the 1970s and gradually scaled back over the following two decades.

While state broadcasting was still the only provider of radio programs licensed in East Germany, private radio stations started operating in West Germany in the mid-1980s . It is the beginning of the so-called “ dual broadcasting system ”.

In 1987 there were a total of 36 public broadcasters and eight private broadcasters.

On July 23, 1988, Radio Dreyeckland in Freiburg, Germany's first free radio, was legalized after the pirate radio could no longer be prosecuted . In Switzerland , on November 14, 1983, the free radio Radio LoRa in Zurich went on the air. In connection with the "free radio stations" one also speaks of the "triple broadcasting system", which means the division of the existing frequencies into three pillars of public, commercial and non-profit independent broadcasters.

After the wall came down

The collapse of the GDR also meant the end of state broadcasting. In 1990/91 the East German broadcasters were renamed, staff were cut and broadcasting was discontinued on December 31, 1991 on the basis of the State Treaty on Broadcasting in the United Germany.

The ARD was expanded to include the two East German stations ORB (merged with the SFB to form the RBB in 2003 ) and MDR . In (national) radio, the merger of the East German DS Kultur (formerly Deutschlandsender), the West Berlin broadcaster RIAS 1 and the West German Deutschlandfunk in 1994 resulted in DeutschlandRadio with two programs, DeutschlandRadio Berlin and DeutschlandRadio Köln. Later the programs Deutschlandfunk, Deutschlandradio Kultur and DRadio Wissen emerged from this.

In 2015 there were 63 public, 233 private and 106 other radio stations.

Cultural promotion

To promote culture, the public service broadcaster in Germany maintains 14 symphony and radio orchestras, eight choirs and four big bands. With these ensembles, public broadcasting is the largest concert organizer and one of the most important clients for composers. The development of radio plays and dialect literature is also promoted by public service broadcasters.

Overall, however, the situation in terms of cultural funding has reversed compared to the post-war years. Although the public broadcasters still cover a significant spectrum of cultural services, the work for radio is not only paid significantly less than on television, but in many cases has become a losing business for the authors and artists involved. A gap has arisen between well-paid and socially secure salaried radio workers and the so-called "free" who can often no longer make a living from their work.

future

This article or the following section is not adequately provided with supporting documents ( e.g. individual evidence ). Information without sufficient evidence could be removed soon. Please help Wikipedia by researching the information and including good evidence.

As far as programming is concerned, the future of radio depends, among other things, on the quality and reliability of the broadcasters. In the “Tutzinger Appell” for a “credible radio” in 2007, media makers criticized manipulations and covert PR in the program.

In technology, the European Commission is demanding that the member states switch off analog broadcasting by the beginning of 2012. Germany has undertaken to switch off analog broadcasting (including FM, medium wave) by 2010. DAB is planned as the technical successor to analogue radio, although it has not yet been able to establish itself with German consumers. DRM was developed as an alternative for medium wave transmitters . (see also analog "switch-off" )

attachment

literature

Across epochs:

• Konrad Dussel : German radio history. 2nd Edition. UVK, Konstanz 2004, ISBN 3-8252-2573-9 . ( UTB , volume 2573)
• Hansjörg Bessler: Listener and audience research. In: Hans Bausch (Ed.): Broadcasting in Germany. Volume 5, dtv 3187, Munich 1980, ISBN 3-423-03187-5 .

Weimar Republic:

• Winfried B. Lerg : The broadcasting policy of the Weimar Republic. In: Hans Bausch (Ed.): Broadcasting in Germany. Volume 1, dtv 3183, Munich 1980, ISBN 3-423-03183-2 .

Nazi period:

• Ansgar Diller: Broadcasting Policy in the Third Reich. In: Hans Bausch (Ed.): Broadcasting in Germany. Volume 2, dtv 3184, Munich 1980, ISBN 3-423-03184-0 .
• Inge Marßolek, Adelheid von Saldern (Ed.): Radio in National Socialism. Between steering and distraction. In: Listening and being heard. Volume 1, Edition Diskord, Tübingen 1998, ISBN 3-89295-638-3 .

GDR:

• Inge Marßolek, Adelheid von Saldern (Hrsg.): Radio in the GDR in the fifties. In: Listening and being heard. Volume 2, Edition Diskord, Tübingen 2001, ISBN 3-89295-639-1 .
• Patrick Conley: The partisan journalist. Metropol, Berlin 2012, ISBN 978-3-86331-050-9 .

Federal Republic of Germany until 1990:

• Hans Bausch: Broadcasting Policy after 1945. Part 1, In: Broadcasting in Germany. Volume 3, dtv 3185, Munich 1980, ISBN 3-423-03185-9 .
• Hans Bausch: Broadcasting Policy after 1945. Part 2, In: Broadcasting in Germany. Volume 4, dtv 3186, Munich 1980, ISBN 3-423-03186-7 .

See also

• Category: Broadcasting year (chronology of broadcasting)
• Broadcasting companies in the Weimar Republic (table)

Web links

General:

• Link catalog on the history of radio broadcasting at curlie.org (formerly DMOZ )
• SWR2 archive radio: historical recordings and interviews from the beginnings of radio
• Analog broadcasting on the verge of extinction since 2015! 200 million radios ready for scrap
• The only radio report from a concentration camp (Oranienburg 1933) , German Radio Archive
• Wumpu's world of radios, radio history, technology compendium and virtual online museum
• Virtual memorial plaque "This is where German radio began in 1923, Voxhaus"

Museums:

• Bremen Radio Museum
• Radio receiver from the early days , still operational
• Radio and Telephone Museum Rheda-Wiedenbrück
• Transmitter and radio technology museum in Königs Wusterhausen
• Brunn Broadcasting Museum
• Fürth Broadcasting Museum
• German Broadcasting Museum

supporting documents

1. ^ The newspaper called Zeitungs-Verlag , published in Magdeburg, emphasized the advantages of press broadcasting over wire broadcasting in its October 26, 1920 edition. It transmits the "keyed" information "circularly", that is, from a sender to any number of (paying) recipients. In contrast, with wire radio there was one transmitter per receiver. The article author puts the word broadcast in quotation marks. the word was still new then.
2. ^ Eva Susanne Breßler The broadcasting industry in the Weimar Republic . In: From the experimental stage to the propaganda instrument. Böhlau Verlag , Cologne, 2009. ISBN 978-3-412-20241-5 . Page 63 f.
3. ↑ Broadcasting in Germany. In: The London Times. October 6, 1927, p. 6.
4. ↑ This figure was based on the template: Inflation determined and refers to last January at the most
5. ↑ Horst Jaedicke The good old Südfunk Hohenheim Verlag. Stuttgart, 2005. Page 202. ISBN 978-3-89850-126-2 .
6. ↑ A short chronicle of radio in Central Germany. Publication of the Central German Radio ( Memento from January 29, 2006 in the Internet Archive ).
7. ↑ ^{a b} Niklas Wieczorek: “Preußen Münster turns the thing” - history of football on the radio ( memento from September 9, 2012 in the web archive archive.today ), in: Q History , April 8, 2011.
8. ↑ ^{a b} Andreas Bode: Football at the time of National Socialism. 2008, ISBN 978-3-17-020103-3 , p. 163.
9. ↑ Meyer's Encyclopedic Lexicon. Vol. 6, p. 697, Mannheim 1972
10. ↑ Peter Manteuffel: In: How radio began in Germany. ELRO Verlagsgesellschaft mbH, Königs Wusterhausen 1994, p. 24
11. ↑ This chronological information from: With 8 kW around the world. German world radio in the Weimar period. History of shortwave broadcasting in Germany 1929–1932. German wave. Cologne. Publishing house Haude and Spener, Berlin 1969.
12. ↑ Rundfunk Jahrbuch 1933, p. 139 f.
13. ^ The German telegraph, telephone and radio system 1899-1924 . Telegraphisches Reichsamt, Berlin 1925, p. 139. The book is in the library of the Museum for Communication in Frankfurt
14. ↑ Ernst Klöcker: The radio system in Germany and the economic importance of broadcasting , dissertation at the University of Erlangen 1926, p. 53ff
15. ↑ After the Second World War, with the establishment of new broadcasting structures, the individual broadcasters set up departments for “program exchange”, which ensure that broadcasts are taken over in a regulated manner. Merging channels is also a common cost-saving measure today.
16. ↑ This initial structure, co-inspired by the BBC , set the course for what later became public broadcasting in broadcasting in the Federal Republic of Germany . The “monitoring committees” in connection with the “cultural advisory board” were in this respect forerunners of the broadcasting council .
17. ↑ The program of the Deutschlandsender was inspiration for other stations to offer hours of education. They were already called " school radio " at the end of the 1920s
18. ↑ Official Gazette No. 81 of the Reichspostministeriums and Reichsministerialblatt 1925, p. 1001: Announcement on entertainment broadcasting of August 24, 1925. Section 1 of the new regulation contained the express prohibition “the news from special services, such as the press and business broadcasting service, to their Recording only the subscribers to these services are corrected ”.
19. ↑ Quoted from Thurn, in Werag , No. 1, 1926. Today, GEMA collects fees for public radio performances with music .
20. ↑ Winfried B. Lerg: The emergence of broadcasting in Germany. Origin and development of a journalistic medium. Frankfurt / M. 1970
21. ↑ In the USA radio was much more important in 1924; this year the inaugural speech of the President was broadcast on radio for the first time.
22. ^ Yearbook of West German Radio 1929, p. 128 f., Rufu-Verlag Berlin
23. ↑ RGBl. I, p. 827 (1924)
24. ↑ http://www.wabweb.net/radio/listen/LWMWeu31.htm
25. ↑ Rundfunk Jahrbuch 1933, published by the working group of publishers of official radio magazines and the Reichs-Rundfunk-Gesellschaft, Verlag JS Preuß, Berlin 1932, p. 28 f. The book is in the library of the Museum for Communication Frankfurt
26. ↑ Rundfunk Jahrbuch 1933, p. 124
27. ↑ Rundfunk Jahrbuch 1933, advertising pages at the end of the booklet
28. ↑ Publishing house advertising by Franckh'schen Verlagshandlung Stuttgart in the publisher's own magazine Kosmos from August 1930, issue 8, p. XII
29. ^ ^{A b} Dominik Reinle: Radio and television in the Nazi era: "One people, one empire, one radio". WDR, July 3, 2005.
30. ↑ Rundfunk Jahrbuch 1933, p. 166
31. ↑ Quoted after the reference date: July 28, 1939 - The “Volksfernseher” is presented. WDR, July 28, 2004, accessed January 6, 2017 . 
32. ↑ Rundfunk Jahrbuch 1933, p. 7
33. ^ Brecht's poetry: new interpretations, edited by Helmut Koopmann, Königshausen & Neumann, 1999, p. 60, ISBN 3-8260-1689-0
34. ↑ Document of the month September 1998: The only radio report from a concentration camp (Oranienburg 1933) ( Memento of the original from July 16, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , German Broadcasting Archive  
35. ↑ Michael Hensle: Broadcasting crime . Listening to "enemy broadcasts" during National Socialism. Berlin 2003, ISBN 3-936411-05-0 , p. 18.
36. ↑ Jochen Klepper: Under the shadow of your wings. From the diaries of the years 1932–1942. Brunnen-Verlag, Giessen 2005, ISBN 3-7655-1815-8 .
37. ↑ See German Broadcasting Archive, Broadcasting Technology and Olympic Games 1936
38. ↑ Göring, together with the post office minister and without inaugurating Goebbels, enforced the “secret decree of the Führer and Reich Chancellor on responsibility in the field of television” on June 12, 1935, which left no authority for the Propaganda Ministry. See also Diller, Rundfunk in Deutschland.
39. ↑ Frith W. Behn: The short wave transmitter. Weidmannsche Verlagbuchhandlung, Berlin 1939
40. ^ Industry magazine Der Radio-Händler dated February 21, 1934
41. ^ Reich Finance Minister Schwerin von Krosigk considered Goebbels' visions to be "propaganda nonsense"
42. ↑ In the election campaign, the NSDAP representative in the postal administration, Jakob Sprenger , made the lowering of the license fee his own.
43. ^ Ansgar Diller: Broadcasting Policy in the Third Reich. In: Hans Bausch (Ed.): Rundfunk in Deutschland , Volume 2, pp. 161 ff., Dtv 3184, Munich 1980, ISBN 3-423-03184-0 .
44. ↑ Dieter Holtschmidt: Volksempfänger. History and technology of community devices, Hagen 1981 (self-published), p. 92
45. ↑ Ernst Walther Stockhusen: From the oldest to the newest VE device (from VE 301 W to DKE 38 B). A help book for all people who listen to the Volksempfänger, radio hobbyists and radio and repair technicians . Leipzig 1942. Reprinted by Herten 1991 p. 101
46. ↑ In the archive for radio law. Official Journal of the Reich Broadcasting Chamber, ed. v. Reich Broadcasting Chamber. (renamed “Rundfunkarchiv” from January 1, 1938), medienstimmen.de
47. ↑ Der Radio-Händler , No. 1, 1938, p. 17
48. ↑ Major attack by Allied bombers: My grandfather's experiences in World War II. In: General-Anzeiger . November 25, 2013, accessed January 6, 2017 . 
49. ↑ Today's radio feature has little to do with these pure reportage programs, which should give the impression that the listener is very close to the action live (even if that was often not the case); the common denominator is the factual content, i.e. the missing fictional elements.
50. ^ Herbert Schroeder: Interpreter and weapon. In: Welt-Rundfunk. Issue 2, March / April 1943.
51. ↑ The post office was well suited as a location for the broadcasting studios because the cable connections to Berlin ran through it.
52. ↑ See also Clandestine radio . Most of the secret broadcasters during World War II broadcast Gray Clandestines and Black Clandestines - gray or black propaganda.
53. ↑ R. Dorgelès: La Drôle de Guerre. 1957, cited, like some things in this section, from Werner Schwipps: Word battle in the ether. The German international broadcaster in the Second World War. Deutsche Welle, Haude & Spenersche Verlagbuchhandlung, Berlin 1971, ISBN 3-7759-0147-7 .
54. ↑ Ursula E. Koch, Markus Behmer (ed.): German journalism in exile 1933 to 1945. People - positions - perspectives. Lit-Verlag Münster, ISBN 3-8258-4615-6 , p. 202.
55. ↑ World-Radio Handbook for Listeners 1949/50, p. 21
56. ↑ The Mitteldeutscher Rundfunk has existed since the beginning of broadcasting in Germany in 1924, when it was still called Mitteldeutsche Rundfunk AG (MIRAG). Under the National Socialists it became the "Reichssender Leipzig". The GDR restored the old name.
57. ↑ See e.g. B. "Nürnberger Nachrichten" v. September 28, 1951, p. 3: "Television premiere in Fürth"; the station broadcasted daily at 11, 14 a.m. 4 p.m. from a fictional film that was shot in Nuremberg a. Fürth could be received.
58. ↑ ^{a b} Development of the number of public and private radio stations * in Germany from 1987 to 2015 de.statistica.com
59. ↑ On the meaning of the “three-dimensional broadcasting system”, see: “Charter of Free Radios” from Radio Helsinki - Association for Free Radio Styria .