At the beginning of the Second Republic, only ten radio stations derived from those authorized in 1924 were broadcast in Spain. There were, therefore, many areas without coverage when broadcasting already aspired to be a valuable public service. A decree published in 1932 would light up 58 new private stations, one per city, with a specific power, a minimum distance between them, schedules, advertising percentages and other details endorsed by the Telegraph Corps. The studios, the antennas, the personnel, the contents and the costs were the challenges to survive when the number of declared receivers, in 1932, did not reach 83,000, to be more than 300,000 in 1936, a figure obviously lower than reality when excluding of that data the unregistered.
Since 1925, thanks to the proximity of Madrid, the few Toledo “Galenists” already listened to the pioneering Radio Ibérica, Radio Castilla, Unión Radio or Radio España. A decade later, the number of listeners and devices – now valves – had grown, being able to tune in to the first station installed very close to Zocodover.
The history of EAJ-49 Radio Toledo began in 1933. The concessionaire was Pedro Pastor Segura, a Telegraph officer, who also obtained the callsign EAJ-50 RadioLas Palmas, which he would direct for many years. Actually he was the technician required to grant the license. He began the work in Toledo together with Arsenio del Pozuelo Bustor, an agent of the Transradio company, created in 1918, as a subsidiary of the German Telefunken. A 1929 decree assigned the former the international telegraphy service with coastal antennas in the Canary Islands. In 1932, the same company opened in Madrid, E.A.Q, Transradio Española to broadcast, by short wave, to Europe, America and North Africa.
Let’s say that the indicative of the Toledo station reflected in the press, until 1936, was EAJ-49 Inter Radio Toledo. With the prefix «Inter» we also find the already mentioned Radio Las Palmas and the one set up in Salamanca (EAJ-56), in 1934. According to the newspaper El Adelanto of that city, its adjustment was made by Pedro Pastor, «technician of the Inter -Radio station concessionaire». Therefore, it is obvious that Radio Toledo was born and belonged to the same company whose activity ended in the Civil War. After the conflict and after two seizures (the republican and the Francoist), Sergio Fernández Yela is cited as the owner of EAJ-49. In 1950 it was bought by Ramón de Rato, a participant in the creation of Radio Nacional de España, in Salamanca, in 1937. Radio Toledo would be the head of the Rueda de Emisoras Rato that grew and survived until 1990, the year in which ONCE acquired the station. which was renamed Onda Cero.
The first local review found is the permission that the City Council granted, on August 28, 1933, to the aforementioned Pedro Pastor to install the station, which months later was located at Calle de la Sillería, 14, in front of the corner of the square of Saint Augustine. In November it was already installed and, according to a press release, authorized to be able to radiate once a week “beyond the Atlantic”. It was added: «the Voice of Toledo will be heard throughout America». It was directed by Angel Aguilar Navarro, from the Telegraph Corps, highlighting the names of Felipe Martínez Vega as announcer, linked to the Press Association, and Pedro del Real, Telegraph Warden, as technician. In December, the first rehearsals broadcast the station’s callsign, varied music and some message, such as the repeated reading of a text from the mayor’s office (Guillermo Perezagua) asking for cooperation to alleviate the workers’ strike. Soon, listeners called confirming the quality of the tests. Broadcast advertising, “protector fees” and any help from “cooperating partners” were announced. Some brought their records to the station and others would collaborate to fill the spaces on the daily grill.
The official tests occupied the month of January 1934 with a single nightly block of music and news, from nine to ten thirty. Music or singing groups and soloists also performed, as well as various guests speaking on disparate topics. The official inauguration took place on February 1, at eleven o’clock at night, after connecting, by microphone line, with the short wave station E. A. Q. Transradio, which forwarded it to Europe and America. The attendees spoke from the studio and, through a “thread”, linked to the “house of the Count of Toledo” (now the Benacazon palace), the chords of the Academy band arrived, which interpreted the planned scores there. The initial greeting, in several languages, was made by José Sainz, head of the Tourist Office. The words of Angel Aguilar followed (which included a message from Mayor Perezagua), the director of the Art Society, Luis Sales, and the Cuban painter and consul in Toledo, Esteban Domenech. The Toledo tenor Lorenzo Sanchez-Cano performed compositions of zarzuelas and Adiós a la vida de Tosca. The journalist Gómez de Camarero read some pages specially addressed to the audience of Toledo de Ohio.
Radio Toledo, like other stations of the time, came to broadcast three time slots of an hour and a half in the afternoon, afternoon and evening. He addressed listeners in his domestic sphere and in collective spaces such as casinos, cafes, taverns, etc.
El Castellano published a Radio Listener’s Guide detailing the planned musical pieces and special events of its own production or shared with Madrid stations. For example, in that year of 1934, the beats of some dances in the Plaza de la Armería and concerts broadcast from the Monumental Cinema and the Spanish Theater were heard in Toledo. During Holy Week in 1935, connections were exchanged with Radio España to follow the processions and other events held in both cities. Weeks later, in the month of May, a football match played in Lisbon was heard and, from the Teatro Rojas, with Unión Radio and Radio España, the evening of the III Centenary of Lope de Vega was broadcast. In the month of July, the microphones were taken to the patio of the nearby and luxurious Hotel Castilla for “a special Spanish-Yankee radio broadcast”, with the same stations and the powerful E.A.Q. Transradio. The Minister of State, North American diplomats, local authorities and illustrious guests participated in it to gloss relations with Toledo of Ohio. In 1936, regarding the February elections, Inter Radio Toledo covered the rallies held at the Rojas Theater. In the month of July, and from the same place, he broadcast the Provincial Pedagogical Congress held a week before the outbreak of a war that would also alter all Spanish radio broadcasting.
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