John Kenny on 24.03.82 (courtesy Lillian O’Donoghue)
This is a recording of two night-time DJs on South Coast Radio in its early days in 1982. Recorded from 104 FM on 13th April, it runs from 2130-2305 and features John Kenny for the first hour, followed by the late Alan Reid (Henry Condon). John began broadcasting with Dublin pirates including Radio City and Big D at the end of the 1970s before moving to Cork in 1982. He worked with Q102 in Dublin in the mid-1980s and has been a journalist and broadcaster with RTÉ Sport since 1987.
After South Coast, Henry moved on to Dublin super-pirates Radio Nova and Q102 later in the 1980s where he was known as Henry Owens. After the pirate era he worked for longwave giant Atlantic 252 and UK stations over the next decade before returning to Ireland in 2001 to set up Cork station Red FM. He later worked for Cool FM and Downtown Radio in Belfast and died in 2013 at the age of 52.
Pete O’Neill blows out the candles on his birthday cake (courtesy Lillian O’Donoghue)
Today we feature three hours of afternoon programming on Cork super-pirate South Coast Radio from 1982, not long after it was launched. Pete O’Neill is on air with his usual mix of music and requests, including the Listener’s Top 5 after the 2pm news, the ‘3 at 3’ after the 3pm news and oldies spot ‘South Coast Supergold’. Station staff and loyal fan Lillian McCarthy (O’Donoghue) sing ‘Happy Birthday’ to Pete who is presented with a cake in studio. The voice of legendary DJ Tony Allan is heard on ads and on a promo for South Coast Radio ‘jobline’, a service to advertise job vacancies. There’s also a promo for the American Country Countdown, a syndicated programme from the US, and Pete announces a new events spot ‘What’s on in Munster’ that will air every weekday afternoon.
The recording is divided into four segments, running from 1305-1610 on 25th March 1982. News on the hour is read by Mark Lawrence and Pete’s show is followed by the late Keith York.
Part 2 from 1353Part 3 from 1440Part 4 from 1525
The recording was made from 104 FM but is in mono. South Coast also broadcast on 1557 kHz AM, announcing 194 metres. Thanks to Lillian O’Donoghue for the recording and photo.
Pete O’Neill on the day of the recording, 24th March 1982 (courtesy Lillian O’Donoghue).
This is a recording of Cork super-pirate South Coast Radio shortly after the station’s official launch in March 1982. On air is one of the station’s founders Pete O’Neill with his early afternoon show. Pete thanks the late Hugh Browne who was on before him. News on the hour is read by Mark Lawrence and the show also contains a listener’s Top 5 songs and hospital radio requests.
Part 1 above was made from 1300-1345 on 24th March 1982. Part 2 below is from the same day and runs from 1346-1430. Both were made from 104 FM but are in mono. South Coast Radio also broadcast on 1557 kHz, announcing 194 metres.
Part 2 of the recording
Thanks to Lillian O’Donoghue for the recording and photo.
Keith York on 24.03.82 in the South Coast studio (courtesy Lillian O’Donoghue).
South Coast Radio was the first big station to shake up the Cork radio scene introducing a level of professionalism and slickness not heard on the smaller pirates that had sprung up since the late 1970s. The station was set up by Pete O’Neill and Peter Maher who had worked previously with Radio City and was on air by February 1982. South Coast was launched officially on March 3rd and the first voice heard was Peter Madison (RIP) who at various times presented on other stations such as Sunshine Radio, Radio Nova, Magic 103 and Boyneside Radio. South Coast was based at the Metropole Hotel in McCurtain Street until April 4th 1982 when it moved to Adelaide Place in St. Luke’s. On 26th September it moved again to a premises above Henchy’s Bar also in St. Luke’s. South Coast closed on 13th July 1984 and was revived briefly but didn’t last long.
This recording is of the late Keith York on South Coast’s official launch day, 3rd March 1982. It was recorded from 104 FM and runs from 1752-1855. The station also broadcast on 1557 kHz, announcing 194 metres. Keith had previously worked on the Voice of Peace, Radio Capitale in Brussels and in Dublin pirates Southside Radio and Island Radio. Thanks to Ian Biggar for the recording and Lillian O’Donoghue for the background information and photos.
Pete O’Neill in studio in March 1982 (courtesy Lillian O’Donoghue).
Pete O’Neill remembers:
I came up with the name South Coast Radio and the concept in the summer of 1981 having travelled to Portmarnock in Co. Dublin to spend a few days visiting Sunshine Radio. I approached Peter Maher, a salesman with me at Radio City and he agreed to work with me on it. He quit his job with an insurance company and we both left Radio City to work on the project. We had to sell some of our record collection to fund coffee and scones!
Peter assembled six business men in the Imperial Hotel and they all agreed to commit to the initial tune of £25,000. I travelled to London as a late teenager and purchased Technics turntables, Revox PR 99s, AKG Mics, a Quad amp and Kef speakers at a London outlet Music Lab. I also purchased many vinyl records at several stores to have shipped back to Ireland for a record library. After a trip around Capital Radio with Michael Aspel, I went to Kent to visit a rep for Pams Jingles. While there, I went over my lyrics to a re-sing of a QRUU/Radio Luxembourg package. I then headed to Brighton where I visited the Alice Stancoil factory and purchased an STM-8 Mixer (the same one as Sunshine had), an Alice 2008P production mixer and Sonifex cart machines.
I can remember all the equipment stored in a warehouse on Patrick’s Quay. I wired up the Revox and speakers and John Ashford (John Buckley) and myself listened to the new jingle package on Ampex tape. Amazing! We used the Southern Advertising Agency to design our headphones logo and they also did the initial launch photos using models. We secured a medium wave TX site near the airport which would be used with a 1kW transmitter. The then head of air traffic control at Cork airport built our FM TX, having given me a shopping list of parts including a Phillips stereo generator. He constructed it in his garden shed and I can remember him showing me the progress as it was built into a filling cabinet!
One of our shareholders knew the managing director of the Metropole Hotel so we acquired two rooms which we converted to studio/production. Great fun was had here with room service for the presenters! We even recorded cheerleaders from the States over for the St. Patrick’s Parade for station imaging. We made the front page of The Irish Times on April 2nd 1982 after Peter Madison told listeners to retune to watch him on breakfast television as an April Fool’s joke. The NUJ Cork branch were not happy with a pirate located in the hotel and protested outside, so we were forced to relocate.
I brought on many of the best local presenters to the station including Henry Condon (Alan Reid RIP), Neil Prendeville (Jim Lockhart), John Buckley (John Ashford RIP), Luke Ward, Steve Douglas and George Long. Most were on weekends so I needed to find others for weekdays. I was hoping I could attract some from Sunshine in Dublin like Tony Fenton and Declan Meehan but they had moved on to the new Radio Nova. Siobhán Walls and Stevie Dunne came down as did Keith York (RIP), Hugh Browne (RIP), John Kenny, Peter Madison (RIP) and Nick Richards. Later the line-up included John Lewis, Don Stevens and Steve Marshall.
We eventually moved to 40 St Luke’s Cross after a short stint at a premises nearby. This was to be our permanent home and consisted of reception, advertising offices, record library, production, news, and on air studios and of course a pub downstairs! I talked a friend’s mother to agree to give us a part of her farm land at Dublin Hill and we put up a higher AM mast there. We also flew in a 10,000 watt AM TX which took some time to get up and running with the help of Keith, Terry Vacani and a relation of one of our directors from east Cork. The sound and coverage was amazing with the signal loud and clear in Dublin and the south coast of England and London by night.
I gave away a £1,000 summer splash-out on air and the initial response was so great that it blew many of the Telecom exchange lines. I had to re-run it a week later! South Coast’s signal, sound, quality and personality of presenters and imaging was amazing and it quickly became an instant hit. There were problems down the road though with our new competitor ERI and we had water put into our site generator and then the entire mast was cut down. This, coupled with a major fire at the site and RTE jamming of commercial breaks, led to a quick demise of the station. I left in early 1984 as the writing was on the wall. I’m very proud to have met and worked with so many talented people, and to be afforded the opportunity to put on an amazing station while still in my late teens. South Coast radio will always be one of my favourite achievements!
Boyneside QSL postcard from 1982 (courtesy Ian Biggar).
In July 1981, a split in Boyneside Radio led to the breakaway station Community Radio Drogheda and the town had two rival stations for the best part of a year. This recording was made in July 1982, shortly after the two stations merged once again. There was some variation in the name around this time: the cassette label refers to Boyneside Community Radio and ‘Boyneside/CRD’ was used on air until the late summer, when the station reverted to Boyneside. Read more about Community Radio Drogheda here.
Cassette label referring to ‘Boyneside Community Radio’.
The recording was made from 1500-1535 on 19th July 1982 from 99.5 FM in mono. The presenter is Boyneside stalwart Eddie Caffrey with the afternoon ‘teatime’ slot and a lost-and-found section. News is read by Gerry Malone, another well-known Boyneside voice. There is some wobble on the cassette due to deterioration over the decades.
1982 letter from Eddie Caffrey to a Swedish DXer (courtesy Ian Biggar).
This recording is from the Anoraks Ireland Tapes Collection, donated to us by Paul Davidson. Further material from this collection can be found on Radiowaves and the Irish Pirate Radio Archive.
