ABC station older than the ABC itself celebrates 85 years of radio in central Queensland

Extract from ABC News 

ABC Capricornia

By Jodie van de Wetering

Posted Thu at 6:47pm

Photo: Radio historian David Brownsey holds a 1930s photo of engineers with the original microphones from 4RK. (ABC Capricornia: Jess Hinchliffe)

Map: Rockhampton 4700

One of regional Queensland's oldest radio stations is celebrating 85 years of continuous operation, making it an ABC station older than the ABC itself.

4RK was started by the privately-run Australian Broadcasting Company in Rockhampton in central Queensland on July 29, 1931.
Radio historian David Brownsey said that was almost a year before the ABC as we know it was created.
The Australian Broadcasting Commission — later to become Corporation — was launched the following year on July 1, 1932.
The ABC took on 4RK, and the Rockhampton station became the fledgling national broadcaster's first regional Queensland station.
"Radio in those days was quite a novelty, and sets were expensive and few and far between, but they had a very, very attentive audience," Mr Brownsey said.

Photo: Brisbane radio historian David Brownsey has been following the fortunes of Rockhampton radio station 4RK, now known as ABC Capricornia. (Jess Hinchliffe)

Twenty-three years ago an aspiring radio presenter a few weeks away from his 21st birthday applied for a job with ABC Capricornia (as 4RK is known).
He was Spencer Howson, who has now been at the helm of 612 ABC Brisbane's top-rating Breakfast show for 15 years.
"At times I do joke about the time I spent in Rockhampton, but in truth I wouldn't change a thing," Mr Howson said.

"Whenever I talk to journalism students or people wanting to get into radio, I always tell them how enriching it will be to spend a couple of years outside the south-east of the state."

One of the highlights of Mr Howson's time in Rockhampton was reporting on a man who hatched a scheme to buy one mushroom at a time from the supermarket, because the price rounded down to nothing.
The story led to shoppers being banned from buying individual mushrooms.

Photo: 4RK listing in a radio guide from 1935, from radio historian David Brownsey's archive. (Jess Hinchliffe)

Andrew Lofthouse, a familiar face in Queensland homes from presenting the statewide television news on the Nine Network, also spent time working at the Rockhampton station.

"The first day I was supposed to come to work, I couldn't get to the studio because there was a bomb scare at The Factory nightclub around the corner and police had cordoned off the entire block," Mr Lofthouse said.

"I remember getting a call in the morning saying 'You'd better not come in because they're not going to let you near the building', so what a start that was."
Mr Lofthouse did eventually get in the building, and said his experience in Rockhampton was "the best possible start I could get in radio".
"I remember doing an outside broadcast from the Beef Expo down near the showgrounds, and all of a sudden getting taken off air," he said.
"It took us a long time to work out what the problem was. We checked all our connections, we checked the outside broadcast trailer, the studio, all of those things.
"In the end we discovered a bull had trodden on the power cord going to the circuit box and pulled the plug out."

Photo: 4RK staff and visiting engineers outside the 4RK radio station and residence at Pine Tree driveway Gracemere in the 1930s. From left an unknown engineer, Nat Gould, Hughie Thane, Bebe Scott, Harry Conway, Ian Hamilton, Cap Randall, Bert Jack, and an unknown engineer. (Supplied: David Brownsey)

Cath Hurley, the ABC's head of regional content, started her career as a rural reporter at 4RK.
"It was a wonderful opportunity," Ms Hurley said.
"It's one of the most challenging and rewarding jobs in the ABC.
"I'd been in the station for about a month when the second rural reporter said 'I'm going out west, can you present the television weather for the next two weeks?'
"In those days they used to draw the maps with coloured markers. You'd get the information on the telex machine, and you'd stand in front of the camera and deliver the weather.
"Fortunately at the time it was the middle of winter, so it was fine and sunny in central Queensland virtually every day."

Photo: 4RK's original station and two transmitters at Gracemere in the 1930s. (Supplied: David Brownsey)

Award-winning journalist Chris Masters, Four Corners' longest serving correspondent, credits his time at 4RK in the late 1970s for launching his career in television.
"It was my first stint in television, and while I'd worked in radio for half a dozen years, to my surprise I found television just worked for me," he said.
Mr Masters said working in regional stations built strong storytelling skills in broadcasters, and had honed his work ethic.
"I remember having to come back with something like four stories in a day and doing them all on a 10-minute reel of film," he said.
"That generated discipline that was particularly valuable to me later in my career."
Mr Masters still has painful memories of losing four 4RK colleagues in a plane crash in October 1983.
The light aircraft was on a charter flight from Rockhampton to Kenlogan Station to gather material for rural current affairs program Countrywide when it crashed about 40km from Clermont.
Lost in the crash were rural reporter Bruce Anning, cameraman Joe Mooney, sound technician Bill Fryer and station manager Ralph Elphinstone, an experienced pilot who was flying the plane.

Photo: Today's ABC Capricornia staff at the station's current premises in Quay St, Rockhampton. From left: journalist in charge Paul Robinson, journalist Chris McKee, producer Inga Stunzner, Early Morning Country presenter Wayne Shearman, chief of staff Chrissy Arthur, rural reporter Amy McCosker, and seated Breakfast presenter Jacquie Mackay. (ABC Capricornia: Jodie van de Wetering)