Rugby Radio Station
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Location | Hillmorton, Rugby, Warwickshire |
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Mast height | 250 metres (820 ft) |
Coordinates | 52°21′57″N 1°11′21″W / 52.36577°N 1.18928°W |
Grid reference | SP5519574542 |
Built | 1926 |
Demolished | 2007 |
Rugby Radio Station was a large British government radio transmission facility just east of the Hillmorton area of the town of Rugby, Warwickshire in England. The site straddled the A5 trunk road, with most of it in Warwickshire, and part on the other side of the A5 in Northamptonshire. First opened in 1926, at its height in the 1950s it was the largest radio transmitting station in the world, with a total of 57 radio transmitters, covering an area of 1,600 acres (650 ha). Traffic slowly dwindled from the 1980s onwards, and the site was closed between 2003 and 2007.[1]
The tallest masts on the site were 820 feet (250 m) tall, and could be seen from up to 20 miles (32 km) away, making the site for many years a major local landmark.[2] Since closure, part of the site has been used for a large housing development called Houlton, named after Houlton, Maine, USA the American town which received the first transatlantic phone call from the station in 1927.[3]
History
Following the end of the
Its large
In 1927, a second transmitter was installed to initiate the first transatlantic commercial telephone service; linking New York and London
A trial transmission of the
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1922 diagram of the transatlantic radio network.
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Strain insulator supporting the cage antenna, 1938
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View of the site, 2005
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The main buildings of the station in 2009. These have been converted into Houlton School
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Control panel of the military very low frequency (VLF) transmitter used to communicate with submarines
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A radio mast after demolition in 2004
See also
- List of masts
- List of tallest buildings and structures in Great Britain
- List of radio stations in the United Kingdom
Notes
- ^ a b "RUGBY RADIO STATION A short history". Our Warwickshire. Retrieved 24 October 2018.
- ^ "Parishes: Hillmorton". British History Online. Retrieved 16 October 2022.
- ^ "Welcome to Houlton - Rugby's new neighbourhood named in honour of town's radio heritage". Rugby Observer. 27 October 2016. Retrieved 16 October 2022.
- ^ "RadioStation Rugby". RadioStation Rugby. 2017.
- ^ http://www.smecc.org/general_electric_computers/Houltonrepeater06123partial.jpg [bare URL image file]
- ^ "Press release about MSF relocation to Anthorn" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 27 September 2007.
- ^ "Rugby Radio". Subterranea Britannica. 28 May 2003.
- ^ Royal Institute of Navigation press release dated 18 May 2005
External links
Film archives
- Rugby Radio Station on YouTube(video, 1:43 minutes)
- The Making of Information Age: Rugby Aerial Tuning Inductor on YouTube(video, 3:02 minutes)
- The World's Greatest Radio Station Aka Rugby Wireless Station (1932) on British Pathefilm about the station.
- G.P.O. Riggers Aka GPO Riggers (1967) on YouTube- short film recording the work of the riggers who worked at the station