Slightly Bemused: Radio Times

Slightly Bemused writes:

They say a picture paints a thousand words. Well, if photographs count, they certainly spawn a thousand words.

I have been gradually cleaning out the house and getting rid of the rubbish, one box at a time. In one cupboard in my back bedroom, I made a renewed acquaintance with an old friend of my childhood – the kitchen radio (above). I shared a photo with the family group in case anyone wanted it, and it sparked a tide of memories. Some from before I was born, some I recall vividly.

An old valve set, it sat on top of the fridge in our house in Dublin, then later in the new house in the town where I still live in Kildare. I understand it sat in my Dad’s house in Cork when he was a lad growing up, but I am not sure if it sat atop his fridge, though. That lore has not been shared.

In the morning it was the start of the wake up ritual before school, as my Dad would get up with his trusty transistor radio (my brother calls it his ‘shaving radio’, although it doubled as the car radio on the dashboard of the whenever Dad drove) tuned to Radio Éireann, as the rousing tones of O’Donnell Abú signalled the start of a new day.

Then the sober tones of Charles Mitchel or Don Cockburn would read out the tidings of the hours since Closedown, and into morning programming. I forget what was that first programme, but it was replaced by Morning Ireland in later years.

As the radio signalled that Dad now had full control of the bathroom (separate in the early house from the toilet) , a waft of ciggy smoke before the door opened and the maternal alarm clock got into full swing. Time to get up, get dressed, and down for breakfast, where the kitchen radio was now in full voice, and the valves nicely warmed up.

After breakfast, it was up to the now vacant bathroom to wash faces (including behind the ears and the back of the neck) as teeth. My toothbrush of the time was a translucent purple handled Colgate model. No idea why I remember that.

Then we moved, but little had changed. Still only one bathroom, but a separate loo outside for the desperate as Dad shaved. The kitchen radio was once again ensconced above our heads on the fridge, obtained from our aunt Nuala when she sold her house in Dublin and moved to live with her husband in Connemara. And the continuity announcer effectively changed channels as the programming moved from news (ugh) to light entertainment (phew).

Mitchel and Cockburn gave way, and O’Donnell Abú now signals the transition from nighttime programming to the day schedule for Rising Time and Morning Ireland, but I do not recall who at the time. Somewhere in my early secondary school days, Anne Doyle‘s dulcet tones started to grace the airwaves, and Éileen Dunne joined soon after, and the male-dominated programming gained more female representation.

So off to school in the new house in particular, as the first notes of The Gay Byrne Hour started. School was close enough to come home for lunch. Greeted by the tail end of the One O’Clock News, we ate our lunch to the dramatic events of Harbour Hotel.

It was to these stories I learned to make French Toast, Sliced Bread Pizza and quick spaghetti, cooking up just the packet of sauce to go with the pasta. We knew it was Summer when Mum made egg spread to have with slices of tomato between two fresh slices of Brennan’s bread, and listened to the seaside shenanigans.

The old radio, which worked the last time it was plugged in, had this ‘magic eye’ that showed two arcs on either side, with the same centre point. As you tuned in, the arcs got bigger, the gaps between them lessened, until at last they met, and you were properly tuned on station. I remember wondering as a kid how it knew when you were tuned in, and would pull a chair over to the fridge to wiggle the tuning knob and watch the green eyed arcs vary.

Before we moved, I recall that my eldest brother found a damaged similar radio. The electronic chassis was intact. After checking it out, he used our working one as a model, bought the new valves, made up a new wooden casing, and sold it.

He was, and still is, extremely gifted with anything electronic. Recently his latest chip design was taken up for upcoming deep space explorers. From repairing a valve radio, to making an oscilloscope from an old broken valve TV set (because Dad would not buy him a real one), to making chips to explore the universe! I just might be able to tune your new TV, but only if it has auto mode :-)

But the magic eye will work no more. The set only received AM signals, and when the final move was made to FM, the old kitchen radio was put aside, and replaced by a newer transistor radio. I don’t know where it travelled over the years, but it was a surprise to find it at the back of my cupboard.

So after offering the radio around, and getting a no from every one, I donated it to our local drama group. They were delighted as they often do shows set in the 30s/40s/50s, and the radio would fit any of those periods.

I was told, also, that many drama groups share props, so it is my hope that our kitchen radio, which was the background to my childhood, will entertain many a house across the country for years to come.

The magic eye may no longer work, but the magic is still there.

Slightly Bemused‘s Column appears here every Wednesday

Pic by Slightly

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