Adelaide celebrates 100 years of radio, from early broadcasters and the ABC, to SA-FM's Skyshow and DAB

A century ago, Adelaideans were introduced to the power of radio after police were called to a crowd of 5,000 people who had gathered on Hindley Street.

They were listening to live federal election results broadcast out the front of 5CL, which had been granted Adelaide's first commercial radio licence the previous year in 1924 — exactly 100 years ago today.

Up until then, most stations were experiments run by enthusiasts, amateurs and musicians, with the first, Harry Kauper's 5BG, being heard in 1921 from as far away as New York and California from its transmitter in Dulwich and then Tusmore.

But 5CL (originally called 5AB) was the first to be granted an A-class licence, meaning it could be funded by listener licence fees, unlike the B-class licence granted to 5DN in 1925.

Launched with the assistance of Mr Kauper, 5DN subsequently became Adelaide's first commercial station to be funded by advertising.

Adopted quickly

The emergence of radio was immediately popular in Australia.

Historical Radio Society of Australia SA (HRSASA) vice president Keith Ellison said at one point in the 1920s there were about 45 different factories in Adelaide "including some big ones in the CBD".

"The National Radio factory in Pirie Street had over 100 staff and they were making radios that were being rebadged under a variety of names for most of the department stores," he said.

"John Martins, David Jones, all of those were selling radios under their own badge, but a lot of them came out of the same factory."

5CL was taken over in 1932 by the newly-formed Australian Broadcasting Commission, which replaced A-class licences, and the two-tier radio system was abandoned.

Shortly afterwards, radio's golden era was born, as families sat in their living rooms listening to scripted radio plays and variety shows on a rapidly expanding number of stations.

"The radio play days, Blue Hills and those sorts of shows, was the big hey day, and there was a lot of comedy," Mr Ellison said.

Serial programs on commercial stations like 5DN, and 5AD and 5KA, gave rise to the term "soap opera", as they were often dramas backed by soap companies targeting female listeners.

Music was a big part of radio too, initially with live concerts for the most part until recorded music technology evolved from gramophones and piano rolls to tape after World War II.

ABC sing-along programs were broadcast to classrooms around Australia, accompanied by songbooks that people could read from, starting in the 1940s and going all the way through to 2014.

By the 60s, radios had become smaller and more portable and were regularly seen at places like the Royal Adelaide Show, the Oakbank racing carnival, or the Adelaide Festival of Arts.

Young people enamoured with pop music were ringing into their favourite stations to request songs, as pop and rock'n'roll trends that had started in the 50s exploded with counter-culture, and Top 40 formats emerged to combat the threat of television after it was introduced in 1956.

One of the biggest radio moments of this scene in Adelaide took place on June 12, 1964, when Lawrie Sjoberg from 5DN recorded The Beatles live performance at Centennial Hall with just four microphones.

An assistant had to stand behind Mr Sjoberg during the concert to press the earphones against his head because the audience was screaming so loud.

"The night we did a recording at Centennial Hall, it was not a good thing for acoustics," he said.

"But for some reason I was able to get the quality."

Management at The Beatles' record company were reportedly so impressed with the quality, they asked how he did it because the standard was better than anything the BBC had managed.

The arrival of talkback radio

The next boon for radio occurred when talkback programming landed in 1967.

"There was a long period of time when radio wanted to do talkback radio but couldn't because they were concerned about people saying things on-air and not being able to stop them," Mr Ellison said.

But the advent of the seven-second delay in broadcasting (today it is 10 seconds) meant producers could have a "dump button" to respond quickly to litigious words or foul language on air.

Federal restrictions were lifted and stations quickly incorporated talkback radio on a variety of topics, from politics, to sport and health.

"Talkback radio rejuvenated radio, took it into a whole new world that TV wasn't able to do," Mr Ellison said.

But as the HRSASA's 100 Radios in 100 Years exhibition at the Adelaide City Council Library reported, not everyone in 1967 was convinced it was a good idea.

"We can expect some drivel from the public and some useful comment from people like you and me," a journalist reported at the time.

"So long as the stations don't go overboard — and there's no sign of that yet — we can expect to hear some of the saltiness of real conversation in among the smooth creaminess of commercials and the rattle of dee-jay patter."

An early star of the format in Adelaide was 5DN's Jeremy Cordeaux, who would have guest interviews (such as former premier Don Dunstan) and then invite listeners to comment.

It enabled radio personalities to thrive, such as Jack Hume — whose family set up 5DN with Harry Kauper and who also presented for ABC Adelaide — and 5AD radio duo Barry Ion and Tony Pilkington (Bazz & Pilko), whose structured segments in the 1970s, like cash calls and The Rumour File, became industry standards that continue today.

Then came the likes of broadcaster Rex Leverington, the ABC's master of the "pregnant pause" Philip Satchell,  Carole Whitelock, who worked in radio for 32 years and once broadcast from a hot air balloon, and Matt Abraham and David Bevan, who dominated the city's breakfast slot throughout the 2000s on ABC Radio Adelaide.

Throughout the 1980s and 90s, radio advertising from the likes of SA-FM broadened into big community events like Adelaide's annual Skyshow fireworks display.

The medium had become an integral part of modern life, highlighted, perhaps, when journalist Murray Nicoll broadcast live on 5DN as his family house burnt down during SA's worst bushfire, Ash Wednesday 1983.

"The air is white with heat and smoke and it's red and there are women crying and there are children here and we are in trouble," he reported on-air.

In 2009 when digital radio arrived in Australia's capital cities, it received another injection of life as a myriad of new stations formed, extensions of existing stations offered a wider variety of programming, and many millions of digital radios were sold across the country and installed in cars.

Fending off challenges

ABC Radio Adelaide director Graeme Bennett said after a century of "amazing change", the world's first broadcast medium remained central to modern life in a fast-changing digital world.

He said it was the "most immediate and intimate of all forms of media" and had the capacity to bring people together "in ways that other forms simply can't".

"What other media can you enjoy without shutting the rest of the world out?" Mr Bennett said.

He said radio had been "consigned to the technological scrap heap countless times, written off as 'heritage' or 'old' media".

"[But] the power of the human voice to connect us, to inform us and entertain us remains undiminished and will survive and thrive far beyond the predictions of its demise," Mr Bennett said.

"From traditional radio, to podcasting and the myriad of emerging audio forms, the future sounds bright.

"Stay tuned."