International Marconi Day
The special event call signs GB2M & GB5LSG are operated by members of the local radio club, Na Fir Chlis ARC, to celebrate the birth of the radio pioneer Guglielmo Marconi, born in Bologna, Italy.
Marconi's father Giuseppe was an Italian businessman and his mother Annie Jameson was Scottish/Irish, from the Irish whiskey distilling family.
Marconi wireless station Lochboisdale 1920's
Wireless stations map
IOTA: EU-010 LOC: IO67id WAB: NF71
Guglielmo Marconi
25 April 1874 ... 20 July 1937
Official International Marconi Day station
Contacts are valid for the IMD award.
The International Marconi Day event takes place every year on the Saturday closest to the actual date of Marconi's birth, this is when many amateur radio special event stations are operated from historic Marconi sites worldwide.
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Activity is on HF and VHF frequencies overlooking the 1907 Marconi station site.
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Lochboisdale
In May 1906 the GPO placed a contract with the Marconi Company, the following year a wireless telegraphy (morse code) station was established in Lochboisdale using Marconi equipment and manned by naval coast guard operators.
The original 1907 Marconi wireless station operated using the call sign LSG.
This was a class "C" station that ran a 4 HP oil engine with a 2KW plain spark rotary
converter at a wave-length of 1000ft or 300m, the aerial was a single mast type 2° cell.
Wireless cottage was purpose built nearby in 1908 as accommodation for the operators who worked at the station, one of those early operators was a Canadian born Royal Marine, Lieutenant Colonel Richard Nelson Bendyshe, a great nephew of Lord Nelson, who briefly took command of the station in 1914.
The GPO telegraphy - morse code - stations in the Outer Hebrides were interconnected by wire, St Kilda was wireless, and messages could be sent from as far away as the GPO station in Stornoway via the wired system to the station at Lochboisdale from where the messages could then be sent to and received from other parts of the British Isles using the wireless system.
This historic Marconi station was sited in the area where the cattle mart now stands and unfortunately there is no trace of it left.
two 75’ masts.
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updated February 2024