AES Marseilles : The American Radio Station That Got Liberated Marseille Swinging

On 28 August 1944, Marseille was liberated by the French Army, following the Allied landings in Provence. Before retreating, the German forces blew up the transmitter mast at Réaltor and set fire to the building housing the 120 kW transmitter. But the technical team managed to salvage equipment from various locations, and Radio Marseille (400 metres 750 kc) was soon back on the air, broadcasting three times a day morning, midday and evening at a power of 3 kW. This would be tripled just a few weeks later.

A transmitter packed into a large trunk

But Radio Marseille wasn’t the only station broadcasting over the airwaves. The Americans were using the port to bring in troops and supplies for their army as it pushed northwards towards the Reich. They also brought their own local radio station, travelling light, just as they had done in North Africa.

Inside the studio control room.

On 22 October 1944, AES Marseilles (American Expeditionary Station) went on the air in the city. Its initial broadcasting hours were 11 a.m. to 2:15 p.m., then 4:30 p.m. to 11:15 p.m. It could be heard on 249 metres (1206 kc). The team was made up of GIs, many of whom had worked in radio before the war, either behind the scenes or on the air. The transmitter was packed into a large trunk, while the station was supplied with records for live broadcasts as well as pre-recorded shows shipped over from the United States.

When the station first took to the air, Sergeant Warner Holmgren was at the microphone. He had already worked as an announcer for the AES station in Sicily. The team also included fellow presenter Jarvis Doctorow, Frederick Norbeck in charge of technical operations, and Raymond J. Doyle, who handled the news.

The station was initially overseen by Lieutenant Stanley Miller, who was replaced a few weeks later by Lieutenant William Loveridge (pictured opposite).

An earlier mobile station near Grenoble

AES Marseilles wasn’t the first US Army radio station to broadcast from France. In his autobiography, Jarvis Doctorow recalls that the two trucks housing the Seventh Army’s mobile radio station had initially followed the army’s advance along the Rhône Valley. The first broadcast actually went out on 1 September, from somewhere near Grenoble, on 242 metres (1240 kc).

The station broadcast three times a day: 6:30 8:15 a.m., 11 a.m. 1 p.m. and 5 10 p.m. Doctorow goes on to explain that he was later asked to return to Marseille to help set up a permanent station there. As a little postscript to the story, he would eventually be recruited to present English-language programmes for French Radio Broadcasting (Radiodiffusion française).

Broadcasting from a hotel room

The AES Marseilles studio wasn’t housed in a truck. Instead, the station was discreetly set up in a hotel room in the city. The premises consisted of two small adjoining rooms and a bathroom. Each of the main rooms measured roughly three by four metres. The first served as the studio, with a clock, two microphones and a piano. The second, separated by a glass partition, had been converted into a technical control room and was crammed with microphones and records. The transmitter itself was tucked away in the tiny bathroom, between the bathtub and the washbasin. Housed in an ebonite case, it hummed away beside an electric fan (see photograph below).

A little later, Leon Leaks, who had worked as a radio presenter for WKRG in Mobile before joining the Army, and Ed Burns, a comedian, also became part of the team. By then, the station was broadcasting from 6 a.m. until 1 a.m., mixing live programmes with a generous helping of shows shipped straight from the United States. These had been recorded on discs measuring around 50 centimetres in diameter and played at 33 rpm, rather than the 78 rpm that was standard for records at the time. Exactly when AES Marseilles went off the air remains unknown. The last GIs left the port in January 1946.

And now, to recapture a little of the atmosphere :