|
Monday,
April 15,
1912, 12:30 AM. "The Wayback Machine" is over the North Atlantic, at 41
degrees 46' North, and 50 degrees 14' West. Down below is a majestic
ship,
the largest and most luxurious ship in the world, on its maiden voyage.
In the wireless room is a 5 kW Marconi station, and before it sit two
tired
operators, who make $20 per month, not as employees of the shipping
line,
but rather as employees of the Marconi Company. The "in" basket is
still
full of messages, everything from personal telegrams to stock market
quotations.
They are so busy working Cape Race, Newfoundland, that they didn't even
notice the slight grinding jar 30 minutes earlier. As the two wireless
operators, Jack Phillips and Harold Bride, passed the routine traffic,
the Captain came in, said the ship had struck an iceberg, and told them
to
send a distress call at once. The blue spark jumped across the gap as
Phillips
sent "CQD" (come quick danger). "Send S.O.S." Bride said, "It's the new
call and it may be your last chance to send it".
Thus
began
the moment in history that changed radio. Two hours later, Jack
Phillips
and over 1500 others were dead, the "Titanic" lay at the bottom of the
ocean, and 713 survivors huddled in half filled lifeboats waiting to be
rescued. The tragic errors in the story of the "Titanic" pointed out
the
need for wireless regulation.
The
first ship to answer the distress
call was the German Liner, the "Frankfurt". While the "Frankfurt"
wireless
operator was informing his captain, the "Carpathia" and Cape Race
chimed
in. When the "Frankfurt" operator came back to get more information,
Phillips
tapped back "SHUT UP, SHUT UP, YOU FOOL. STAND BY AND KEEP OUT". While
this would seem bizarre by our standards, it made perfect sense to the
operators of 1912. The "Titanic", "Carpathia", and Cape Race were
equipped
with Marconi operators and stations, while the "Frankfurt" utilized the
services of Marconi's German competitor, Telefunken. This commercial
war
was extended down to the individual operators. No routine traffic would
EVER pass from a Marconi station to a rival, and, even in an emergency,
if Marconi stations were available, the others would be shut out.
The
wireless controversy would
continue after the "Carpathia" picked up the survivors. A wireless
message
was received, allegedly from the "Carpathia", which said "ALL
PASSENGERS
OF LINER "TITANIC" SAFELY TRANSFERRED TO THIS SHIP AND "S.S. PARISIAN".
SEA CALM. "TITANIC" BEING TOWED BY ALLEN LINER "VIRGINIAN" TO PORT".
Other wireless messages appeared, also stating that ALL passengers were
safe,
and the ship was being towed in. There was just one problem--these
messages
were not coming from the "Carpathia". For one thing, her wireless had a
maximum range of 150 miles. For another, the "Carpathia" wireless
operator
had made only a few transmissions to the "Olympic" (sister ship of the
"Titanic" and another Marconi operation), in which he tapped out the
list
of survivors, some coded messages from Bruce Ismay, President of White
Star Lines, then shut down his station. So complete was the radio
silence
from the "Carpathia", that they refused to answer the calls from Navy
cruisers
sent to the scene by President Taft.
The
White Star Line, owners of
the "Titanic", were still insisting that everyone was safe and the ship
had not sunk. But even as they made these claims, they had all the
horrific
details from the "Olympic". And so would the rest of the world, thanks
to a 21 year old operator named David Sarnoff, who managed to detect
the
faint signals of the "Olympic", and broke the story. Faced with the
truth,
and hounded by thousands of reporters and outraged relatives of
passengers,
the White Star Liner officials finally broke down and revealed all.
Meanwhile,
the "Carpathia" steamed
towards New York City. When she passed within range of shore stations,
there were "frenzied attempts by amateur wireless operators which
formed
a hissing mixture from which scarcely a complete sentence was
intelligible".
It didn't matter, because the radio silence continued.
At
the Port of New York, the "Carpathia"
was met by Senator William A. Smith of Michigan, a no-nonsense Populist
who was the Chairman of the committee investigating the shipwreck. He
immediately
slapped subpoenas on everyone possible, including Harold Bride and
Harold
Cottam, wireless operator on the "Carpathia". Marconi himself, who was
in the U.S. at the time, (and had planned on taking the "Titanic" back
to England), was also summoned to appear.
The
hearings revealed the information
given above, plus the disturbing fact that the "Californian" was just
10
miles from the "Titanic". Not only did the "Californian" not have a
full
time wireless operation, but the ship's captain ignored the eight
distress
rockets sent up by the "Titanic". As to the origin of the false
messages
concerning the saving of the ship and passengers, no answer was ever
found.
However, Senator Smith sarcastically noted that, in the interim, the
"Titanic"
was quickly reinsured, and stock in the Marconi Company jumped from $55
to $225 per share. The Senator DID find out the cause of the
"Carpathia"
radio silence--it was Marconi himself. He had sent wireless messages to
Bride and Cottam stating "MARCONI COMPANY TAKING GOOD CARE OF YOU-KEEP
YOUR MOUTH SHUT-HOLD YOUR STORY-YOU WILL GET BIG MONEY-NOW CLEAR". It
turned
out that Marconi had an agreement with the New York Times for an
exclusive
story. Thus, essential information for desperate relatives and official
inquiries from the President took a back seat to Marconi's interest.
When
Marconi
got on the stand, Senator Smith pounced on him with astonishing
vehemence.
Marconi had been lionized by the nation, and now the Senator was
treating
him like any other entrepreneur who put profit above the public.
Senator Smith was warned that his attack on a man as popular as Marconi
was political
suicide, but he didn't care. In his obsession with his belief that the
unregulated wireless spectrum was partly to blame in the "Titanic"
disaster,
he painted Marconi as a man willing to subordinate the public good to
his
goal of a complete wireless equipment AND spectrum monopoly. Senator
Smith
used the "Titanic" hearings to condemn the laissez-faire status of the
wireless, and appeal for the international regulation of radio.
On
May 18, 1912, Senator Smith
introduced a bill in the Senate. Among its provisions: 1) ships
carrying
50 passengers or more must have a wireless set with a minimum range of
100 miles; 2) wireless sets must have an auxiliary power supply which
can
operate until the wireless room itself was under water or otherwise
destroyed;
and 3) two or more operators provide continuous service day and night.
In response to the interference generated over the years, and
especially when
the "Carpathia" was within range, a provision was added that "private
stations could not use wavelengths in excess of 200 meters, except by
special permission".
To avoid "ownership" of the spectrum by the Marconi Company, licenses
would
be required, issued by the Secretary of Commerce. Each Government,
Marine,
or Commercial station would be authorized a specific wavelength, power
level, and hours of operation.
The
initial legislation had considered
the elimination of all private, non-commercial (i.e., amateur)
stations,
but Congress realized that would be difficult and expensive to enforce.
Therefore, since it was a "well known fact" that long wavelengths were
the best, and anything below 250 meters was useless, except for local
communication,
it was decided to compromise and give the amateurs 200 meters, where
they
could work 25 miles maximum and would die out of their own accord in a
few
years.
How
the amateurs coped with 200
meters will be our focus next time. Hope you'll join us then for
another
trip on "The Wayback Machine."
|
