VOA anniversary spurs museum effort
The Voice of America, which sent its original broadcast overseas 70 years ago this month, will see backers of its first-built transmitting station begin fundraising this year to make it a national museum.
The impact of the local transmitting station was felt in 1944 when the building and its six 200-kilowatt transmitters were completed about a year after groundbreaking.
The station was instantly able to broadcast news to Europe, Africa and South America.
“What happened here is something that I suppose only a few of us in the community understand or realize the significance of,” National VOA Museum of Broadcasting board president Ken Riser said. “None of this had been done before. They couldn’t just pull things off a shelf. They had to actually design, build and construct it all from scratch.
“These were things that were probably equivalent of going to the moon in the ’60s.”
The old VOA Bethany Relay Station is undergoing approximately $500,000 worth of exterior restoration work that includes installation of a new roof and block maintenance on the rear of the building.
Read Adam Kiefaber's Enquirer story (with pictures) on the National VOA Museum of Broadcasting's plans for 2012 at:
http://cin.ci/wClmdq
Our thanks to David Snyder for the above news item
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