Teenagers on the Air : The Unlikely Pirate Radio of Summer 1952

Chalindrey is a small village located in the Haute-Marne department, in the Grand Est region of France. It is notably known for being an important railway junction. In the summer of 1952, Jacques, a student at the École nationale professionnelle in Épinal, returned to the family home to spend the summer holidays. At 15, he was an enthusiastic hobbyist with a passion for electrical engineering. Using parts from old radio sets, he managed to build a small radio transmitter.

He installed it, along with a homemade microphone, in his parents’ attic and stretched a 20-meter antenna wire between the window and a tree in the garden. The transmitter was tuned to 297 meters on medium wave (1001 kHz).

The Cinderella of the Microphone

His friends Marcel (15) and Ginette (in her twenties) joined him to create what would become Radio Chalindrey. The former played the banjo, while the latter, a fan of Robert Lamoureux, recited his monologues. She worked from home repairing stockings and was staying with her grandmother in the village. It was her 14-year-old brother who introduced her to Jacques’s initiative. She was later nicknamed “the Cinderella of the microphone” by the press.

The broadcasts took place in the evening around 6 p.m. The young hosts shared sports results, especially from the Tour de France, read out dedications to local listeners, and reported on town council meetings.

The Police Arrive

However, in the post-war period, the state monopoly over broadcasting frequencies was strictly enforced. Military listening services are said to have intercepted the broadcasts, although others claim that an anonymous letter of denunciation reached the authorities. In any case, at the beginning of September, police officers from Nancy arrived in the village.

The transmitter was seized, and the three hosts had to face legal proceedings. The case was heard in March 1953 at the criminal court in Langres. Ginette appeared but only briefly, and the judges acquitted her. The same applied to the two younger boys, who were tried a little later in juvenile court.