Trans World Radio

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Trans World Radio (TWR) is a worldwide radio mission organization . It was founded by US missionaries and broadcast its first radio broadcast on February 24, 1954 under the name Voice of Tangier from Morocco to Europe.

history

Sender's logo
Logo from ERF International

The founder of the radio mission was the American missionary Paul Freed . The aim of this Protestant missionary work was originally the evangelization of Spain in the sense of an evangelical theology . TWR should support this in the form of Christian radio broadcasts, which were initially broadcast over shortwave in English and Spanish . Since in Spain under Franco foreigners were never allowed to stay in the country for a long time, the transmitter location was Tangier in Morocco . Missionaries from Germany supported this work and so in 1956 German-language programs were broadcast from Tangier for the first time.

The experience gained in Tangier led to the establishment of Evangeliums-Rundfunks in 1959 , which was founded as a German-speaking branch of TWR. This station is based in Wetzlar . The ERF branches in Germany, Austria and Switzerland are now independent partners within TWR.

In the age of decolonization you had to leave the transmitter in Tangier. The Missionswerk built a shortwave transmission station in the Principality of Monaco , which went into operation in 1960. The Mission, now renamed Trans World Radio, shared medium and short-wave transmission systems in Monaco with Radio Monte Carlo .

A few years later, the Missionswerk built its own transmission systems at locations overseas. For example, TWR opened a medium wave and short wave transmission system in the Netherlands Antilles to supply Latin America . Transmitters in Cyprus , Guam , Sri Lanka , Swaziland , South Africa and Armenia followed in the 1970s, 80s and 90s.

The fall of the communist regimes in Eastern Europe resulted in significant changes for TWR. It was thus possible to rent transmitter capacities in Eastern Europe and broadcast programs on local radio stations. In 1992 TWR started broadcasts on the powerful radio transmission systems of Radio Tirana in Albania - the first officially atheist country in the world.

TWR operates a relay transmitter (medium wave) on the Antilles island of Bonaire .

Trans World Radio today

Today, TWR and its national partners broadcast around 1,800 hours a week over 13 major channels on medium and short wave. In addition, programs are broadcast via satellite for Europe, Africa, Asia and South America. Today, programs from the Radio Mission can be received in over 190 different languages and dialects in more than 160 countries .

Cooperations

TWR is a member of various umbrella evangelical organizations in the United States and internationally; these include the Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability (ECFA), the Evangelical Press Association (EPA), the National Religious Broadcasters (NRB) and the International Orality Network (ION).

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