Google-translated from French:
100 years of radio, first! “. This May 12, we celebrate the centenary of the first broadcast of regular radio programs in Spain. It is a highly contested anniversary, because on that date, Radio Iberica was broadcasting without a license.
Radio Iberica SA was founded by two companies. As early as 1922, one of these two companies was already marketing “wireless telegraph receivers for receiving concerts and radiotelegraph and radiotelephone auditions” broadcast from abroad.
Isolated tests were carried out in 1923 and early 1924. It was tempting for Radio Iberica to be the first radio station on the airwaves. To the point of putting the transmitter into service as soon as it was announced that a law would authorize it. A quick start without waiting for the publication of the royal decree and without even submitting the license request!
Illegal broadcasts given that it was only on June 14, 1924 that the royal decree was published. A regulator who fixed the power, prices, broadcast periods and content.
The first broadcasts were produced in the Radio Iberica studios located at Paseo del Rey n° 18, de Más Madrid and broadcast on 392 meters. The broadcasts were scheduled between seven in the afternoon and midnight.
It was therefore only from June that future private radio stations were able to apply for a broadcast license. The first stations registered were EAJ-1 Radio Barcelona, EAJ-2 Radio España, EAJ-4 Radio Castilla, etc. Radio Iberica, our illustrious precursor, obtained the callsign EAJ-6. Then in 1925 there was EAJ-7 Radio Union. Surprisingly, the Radiocommunications Technical and Inspection Council demanded the alternation of nighttime schedules between Radio Unión and Radio Iberica! In 1927, the two stations joined forces with others to begin the creation of a first network.
See you on November 14, to CELEBRATE 100 years of radio in Spain, with SER and legal radio EAJ-1 Radio Barcelona.
To avoid offending anyone and to make everyone agree, we will say that Radio Iberica was the first in Spain and Radio Barcelona was the first in Catalonia! This should save me from neighborhood wars, given that I live near Waterloo in Belgium, the land of exile of Carles Puigdemont!
Michel Fremy, Radio Magazine FB group (2024-05-12)