Pirate Radio Rocks Burnaby!

A look back at various radio stations

Pirate Radio Rocks Burnaby!

Postby Glen Livingstone » Fri Jul 24, 2009 11:19 pm

I've been sitting on the sidelines attempting to maintain radio silence but I guess the time has come to weigh in on this topic.

1969 was forty years ago and recent postings by Mr.-CFAY (Eldon) and VE7ROX (Jim) brought back a lot of good memories.

Let me begin by saying that when it comes to matters of a technical nature both Eldon and Jim and a lot of others back then - Frank Stacey and John Basil Peters take a bow - left me in the dust. What I don't know about the technical ins and outs of constructing an AM radio transmitter out of World War II Navy surplus parts would fill a book, so I was fortunate to have friends like those who were very gifted in that department. All were eager to help out when it came time for me to launch my career as a pirate broadcaster in the wilds of Burnaby.

As Jim mentioned in an earlier post, he and I met in grade two and we became friends. I believe that was before our mutual interest in DXing surfaced.

Maybe it was something in the drinking water that made this little corner of Burnaby, B.C. such a hotbed of future DXer's - I don't know but there sure were a lot of us.

I don't remember the display that Jon had set up in Armstrong Avenue School's auditorium but Jim and Radiofan have both made mention of it so it was an early indication of this soon-to-be-spreading hobby/disease/affliction or whatever you want to call it.

I spent a lot of time listening to the radio back then. My little six transistor fit nicely into my shirt pocket so I could even take it to school with me and monitor my favourite stations.

I don't remember when I began DXing and sending out requests for QSL cards but I guess I was around ten or eleven. I remember what a thrill it was to go home at lunchtime and eagerly open the stack of letters that was always there waiting for me from radio stations all across Canada and the U.S.

I guess I was about fifteen or so when I first crossed paths with Eldon.

Contrary to Jim's recollection, it was through a neighbour who lived across the road from my grandparents in White Rock who knew of my interest in radio and told me about a fellow in Surrey who had a pirate radio station operating out of a shed in his backyard. Turns out it was Eldon, and he invited me over to check out his operation.

After our initial meeting Eldon graciously offered me the opportunity to host a show on CFAY and I accepted.

I reported this exciting information to Radiofan and VE7ROX when I got home and they became involved as well.

Of course none of us drove back then and the bus service across the Putullo bridge was nonexistent so hitch-hiking was our usual mode of transportation. Later on Eldon's father Henry kindly acted as a sort of shuttle-bus service to our Pirate crew and spent a lot of time driving us over the bridge back to Burnaby. I never once heard him complain about it - what a guy!

After our stint at CFAY in Whalley we decided to give it a try ourselves in Burnaby (What can I say - much bigger market) and with the help of VE7ROX and Mr. Peters, we did!

I believe it was around late '69 or early '70.

As I recall VE7ROX built the transmitter and Mr. Peters put together a very simple but servicable mixing board. I bought a couple of turntables from Bill Reiter and soon CKAT was on the air broadcasting live from my bedroom in my parents basement.

Unbelievable! It was magic. I was completely clueless how such a minor miracle like this could happen and of course it just wouldn't have been possible without the help and enthusiasm of these guys I went to school with who just happened to be electronic wizards.

All I wanted to do was sit around and play records - just like 'Bad Boy' in the old Larry Williams tune as covered by the Beatles on the Beatles VI album - "Now Junior, behave yourself!"

But the neighbourhood almost escaped the privilege of being exposed to the unnerving sounds of CKAT radio and the sometimes curious on-air antics of its broadcasting staff.

I remember that day vividly.

Shortly before we signed on the air for the first time I was busily trying to arrange funding for our ragtag flagship enterprise - "Hey mom, can I take those pop bottles on the porch back to the store and keep the money?" - I was exhausted and decided to crash early that night.

The cobbled-together plywood shelf above my bed which held the entire CKAT album library collapsed. It was a close call.

I had just narrowly averted being killed by my own record collection.

Luckily I had woken up out of a sound sleep at around 3 am and decided to have a quick cigarette before going back to bed. Who said smoking was bad for your health? That cancer stick saved my life!

Of course in order to properly operate a pirate radio station you needed to play a good selection of music. Luckily, between Radiofan and myself, we had a lot of records.

But we needed more.

Which was why I decided to try to get on a couple of record company mailing lists so I could start receiving promo copies of the latest releases. I got this idea from Eldon, who managed to get on Elektra's mailing list and was getting new 45's by the Doors and others on their roster.

When I was spinning the tunes on CFAY one of my favorites was 'Down On The Street" by the Stooges, my first exposure to this great band. I spun it on my show a lot. I'm sure the three listeners that I had enjoyed it immensely.

I sent out a few hand-written letters on plain white paper asking for records and got on UNI Records' mailing list which at the time was home to acts such as Neil Diamond and the Strawberry Alarm Clock. They also had a couple of subsiduary labels including Shamley and Revue and I began to receive records from them as well.

Uni was great, New packages of albums and 45's would arrive on a weekly basis and Radiofan and I would ride our bikes down to the New Westminster post office at 6th and Columbia to pick up the loot. We got to know the guy at the counter and he would often 'forget' to charge us the usurious import duty usually required to claim the parcels.

I also started receiving records from Jewel-Paula in Shreveport, Louisiana. I believe CKAT may have been the first West Coast radio station to play 'Judy In Disguise" by John Fred and the Playboy Band, a Paula recording act.

Duke-Peacock Records in Memphis also added the mighty CKAT to its list, so we started getting a lot of great blues 45's by Bobby Bland and Little Carl Carlton, etc. I still have the original letter that Don Robey, the label's president, sent me along with the first batch of records.

CKAT's broadcasting schedule was erratic to say the least.

We'd pretty much fire up the transmitter whenever we felt like it and away we went. Our 'request line' was the telephone booth at the Crest Shopping Centre two blocks up the road. One of us would hop on our bike, ride up there and wait.

Then we would broadcast the phone number over the air and whoever was at the booth would talk to any of the various members of our esteemed but tiny audience who called.

Occasionally we would ask a skill-testing question and the caller who answered it correctly would win a free record. This was pretty much how the joint operated on a day-to-day basis.

Until the day the DOC turned up.

Our first indication that there might be a problem was when a frequent listener to our station - a guy I went to school with - showed up outside the basement window one night and began pounding on it. When I opened it up to see what he wanted he informed me that he had noticed a suspicious looking government vehicle with antennas on the roof slowly driving through the neighbourhood. Apparently it was the DOC - Department of Communications and they were looking for us.

I couldn't believe that these fools were spending our parents hard-earned tax dollars trying to shut down our completely illegal but extremely fun operation.

We quickly shut down for the evening and probably forever.

I can't remember if we ever signed back on again after that incident or not but that was the last we saw of the DOC.

I still wonder how they failed to notice the ten foot tall antenna with the flashing red light on the roof of my parents' garage.

So that's about it. I've forgotten a lot of timelines, dates, participants and other incidentals about my foray into pirate radio in the bum end of the 1960's but it's good to know that Mr. CFAY, VE7ROX, Radiofan, Jon and others have better memories, and in some cases, photographs and other ephemera to prove that this stuff actually happened, that it wasn't just a dream.

Sure it was forty years ago, but what the hell, it was fun well it lasted.

A bad little kid
Moved into my neighbourhood
He won't do nothing right
Just a sitting got to look so good
He don't wanna to go to school
And learn to read and write
Just sits around the house and plays
That rock and roll music all night

Well he put thumbtacks on teacher's chair
Put chewing gum in little girl's hair
Now Junior, behave yourself!

Buys every rock and roll book
On the magazine stand
Every dime that he gets
Oh he's off to the jukebox man

Well he worries his teacher
Till at night she's already to poop
From rocking and a rolling
Spinning in a hula-hoop

Well his rock and roll has gotta stop
Junior's head is hard as rock
Now Junior, behave yourself, ow!

Gonna tell ya mamma
You'd better do what she said
Get to the barber shop
And get that hair cut off your head

You shoot the canary
And you fed it to the neighbor's cat
You have the cocker spaniel
A bath in mother's Laundromat

Well ya mamma said it's gotta stop
Junior's head is hard as rock
Now Junior, behave yourself! Woo


© Larry Williams
Sony/ATV Songs LLC
User avatar
Glen Livingstone
Advanced Member
 
Posts: 948
Joined: Sun May 07, 2006 8:12 pm

Re: Pirate Radio Rocks Burnaby!

Postby Eldon-Mr.CFAY » Fri Jul 24, 2009 11:55 pm

Hi Pluto, Gee that had my attention for the last 10 minutes! I think you did a great job of recalling CKAT's history. Very good indeed! Thanks for the nice comment about my dad too! He passed away in August l993 but did a lot of driving and favors for us radio enthusiasts back then and over the years!!! You know I couldn't remember your station's name, just the frequency of l630 am which I heard in Whalley fairly well. I do remember it now that you jogged my memory! I even have a CKAT or CLOD printed music chart from back then, it may be in my files back in Ontario though. I know I still have it, quite an interesting music chart. You're right, good memories and thanks for the nice comments about CFAY too! By the way VE7ROX told me that it was l450 that CKAT operated on after l630, I thought it was l490. Anyway I wish we had saved more tapes of our broadcasting adventures back in those days! Take care, all the best to you!
Bye . . Mr. CFAY "Frequently On The Frequency"
The CFAY Website: http://cfayradio.wordpress.com
CFAY Radio: http://tinyurl.com/l9qqmh
User avatar
Eldon-Mr.CFAY
Advanced Member
 
Posts: 526
Joined: Fri May 01, 2009 3:09 pm
Location: P.O. Box 3536, Langley, BC V3A 4R9

Re: Pirate Radio Rocks Burnaby!

Postby radiofan » Sat Jul 25, 2009 8:36 am

Eldon-Mr.CFAY wrote:By the way VE7ROX told me that it was l450 that CKAT operated on after l630, I thought it was l490. Anyway I wish we had saved more tapes of our broadcasting adventures back in those days! Take care, all the best to you!


I recall the 1490 being used in about 1971, and the callers were CFHR (Fifteen Hundred Radio).

That transmitter put a nice littel signal across the river into Surrey. I remember hearing "A Country Boy Named Willy" by Spring and "Chick-A-Boom" by Daddy Dewdrop loud and clear while driving south on McBride Blvd and across the Pattullo Bridge.

The 1630 transmitter was an old short wave TX that Jim and Jon Peters did some work on. That one was full of harmonics and was the one that attracted the DOC folk.
Those who danced were thought to be quite insane by those who couldn't hear the music.
User avatar
radiofan
Advanced Member
 
Posts: 13719
Joined: Sun Apr 16, 2006 2:24 pm
Location: Keremeos, BC

Re: Pirate Radio Rocks Burnaby!

Postby skyvalleyradio » Sat Jul 25, 2009 9:41 am

Pluto - thanks for the fascinating tale of CKAT!!! It's great to hear there was so much activity in the greater Vancouver area as we were all growing up in the 60's and early 70's. I promise when I get some time, I'll tell the tales of Salt Spring Island's "offshore" radio activity beginning with Radio Homegrown 89.9 in the late 70's, TNFM 100.3 in the mid-80's and the real origins of Sky Valley Radio! :cheers:
User avatar
skyvalleyradio
Advanced Member
 
Posts: 1109
Joined: Fri Jul 14, 2006 1:16 pm
Location: The Goofy Islands

Re: Pirate Radio Rocks Burnaby!

Postby Woodcarver » Sun Jul 26, 2009 5:12 am

Great "station history", Pluto!

I remember visiting your studio with Eldon shortly after the DOC incident. The thing that impressed me most was how neat and tidy everything was! Equipment beautifully laid-out, cables all strapped and hidden. CFAY, by contrast, was a bit more "rustic". :-)

Fascinating story about your near-miss with your record collection...the pirate radio gods were definitely watching over you that night!

Great memories!

Take care,
Woodcarver (aka Phred)
User avatar
Woodcarver
Newbie
 
Posts: 9
Joined: Tue Jul 14, 2009 4:01 pm

Re: Pirate Radio Rocks Burnaby!

Postby VE7ROX » Tue Jul 28, 2009 1:09 pm

Wow Pluto, what a play-by-play, or "chronicle" of events during that period. Breaking radio silence :cheers: . Sounds like you pretty much nailed it down. I always thought it was through IRCA that we met Eldon, but I see that through a set of circumstances and coincidences, it was your kinfolk in White Rock (and their neighbours), that led us down the path to CFAY. I think IRCA played a part somehow, as I know Eldon was a member of it, as were several of our radio enthusiasts in Burnaby. I can still remember you hearing Radio KDIO Indio, California on the "graveyard" frequency of 1400 KHz, where all stations on that frequency (and 1230, 1240, 1340, 1450 and 1490) were all 1000 watts day and 250 watts night. That was one heck of a catch - it seems to me you wrote to them, and they were so thrilled to hear that they were being heard in Canada that they went way beyond a lone QSL card, and sent a whole whack of other paraphenalia to you.

I still recall at CKAT, while I was at the controls so to speak, somebody coming up to the window and saying "Hey, "Noosh" (Gary Newsham) wants to hear Fried Hockey Boogie by the Canned Heat!". It seems to me that we were glad to oblige, as that record was in the CKAT library. :read2:

They (the graveyard frequencies) might be ideal for pirate stations, as lower-powered stations would be "buried" in the pea soup of stations on those frequencies, especially at night. All stations across the USA and Canada were of course 250 watts night, and there were lots of them. I believe that now, through de-regulation, they can run 1000 watts night. I was running something on 1490 KHz with 25 watts, and covered a good part of Burnaby and Vancouver. On an analog dial (not too many digital ones in those days), it would look as though it was on 1500, so I called it "Fifteen Hundred Radio". :D . I was running 100 watts off and on, using the good old 807 tubes. I got a bit "spooked" when I heard about your encounters with the friendly neighbourhood communications authority, at that time the DOC. It could be that you had spurious signals on frequencies where they should not have been, so that would attract their attention.

I never had any problems with them however, and at night my signal would have been "buried" by the other multiple stations on that frequency, especiallly at their monitoring station. There is a station operating right now on FM 98.7, but only when the FCC offices are closed. We've heard of daytime only stations, but this is a night-time only station, and plays only Hillbilly music, with no ID's. There is occasional talk, and they give out an e-mail address. It seems they sign on at 6:00 PM, and run into the wee small hours of the morning. They do get out - I have heard them in Horseshoe Bay and in Pitt Meadows, so their signal is consistent.

I did put together a chronicle of events at CFAY in the form of a photo slideshow - some pictures are going back to the beginning of CFAY, and some are much more recent, taken during visits to Eldon's, and during DXpeditions in the last few months. I appear in a few of them, as does RadioFan and maybe a few other people you know. You may have seen it already - I arranged it as a link on Eldon's out-going signature on RadioWest. There is sound that accompanies the photos, to make it a bit more entertaining :alien: : http://tinyurl.com/l9qqmh

Sure is nice that all the BDXC (well, almost all) are all brought back together here on the RadioWest forum. These computers are mighty handy for communications. I wouldn't hold my breath on "Baz", or John Basil Peters, and Frank Stacy showing up here. Basil John is on the qrz page: http://www.qrz.com/callsign/VE7BYH , as is myself http://www.qrz.com/callsign/VE7ROX . "QRZ" of course is part of the Q code meaning "Who is calling me?".

Jon posted a topic on John VE7BYH (Basil), as a separate topic all by itself.

:twisted: "Now Junior, behave yourself!" haha. - ROX . . .
RoX ToX in the dialog BoX . . . Bye, Jim VE7ROX
VE7ROX Website: http://ve7rox.spaces.live.com" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
The Law Won:....http://tinyurl.com/2gbzvn" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
User avatar
VE7ROX
Advanced Member
 
Posts: 48
Joined: Sun Nov 09, 2008 8:30 pm
Location: Burnaby, BC, Canada

Re: Pirate Radio Rocks Burnaby!

Postby VE7ROX » Tue Aug 04, 2009 2:44 pm

Eldon! If you are reading this, there is a new Part 15 station proposed for Langley. There is even a website for it, with lots of pretty colors on the site. 8-) Also lots of videos, pictures, radio station logos, links to Part 15 sites, and oodles of other useful intormation. Click here: http://cfayradio.spaces.live.com
Let me know what you see, and if it is somebody that you know. DA MaN JiMMy - ROX . . . :cheers:

:toothy1:
RoX ToX in the dialog BoX . . . Bye, Jim VE7ROX
VE7ROX Website: http://ve7rox.spaces.live.com" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
The Law Won:....http://tinyurl.com/2gbzvn" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
User avatar
VE7ROX
Advanced Member
 
Posts: 48
Joined: Sun Nov 09, 2008 8:30 pm
Location: Burnaby, BC, Canada


Return to Radio Station History

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 86 guests