P.O.W. INGENUITY

Korero (AEWS), Volume 3, Issue 13, 30 July 1945, Page 22

P.O.W. INGENUITY

“ I think that the finest bit of improvization was the construction of our first radio receiver. It was built during the latter part of 1941 and was an incredible achievement under the worst possible conditions. Airmen were rarely allowed to work outside the camps owing to a highly developed homing instinct; they were strictly confined and there appeared to be little chance of obtaining radio parts. Frankly, when the idea was first suggested, I considered it impossible, but our radio men believed that a set could be made on the premises, though valves would present a major headache. They were soon working under the direction of Curley Bristow, Davey Young, and Harry Stubbs. Wireless H.Q. appealed for brass coins, tar from the felted roofs, and tin boxes. What we suffered for our unborn wireless set ! Even our own lighting system was stripped for wire. Shortly afterwards we heard encouraging reports. The condenser had been completed, and what a condenser ! In its construction the trio and their helpers had used a book and sheets of silver paper from the twenty-size cigarette packets—these were inserted between the pages of the book and the whole boiled in grease. lam no radio technician, but I was and still am impressed by the ingenuity of men who can produce a radio condenser —without tools—from a book, silver paper, grease, and old wire. We acquired the valves and the earphone, you might say, dishonestly. At least, they were stolen : the valves from a radio shop in a nearby town ; and Bristow, in a moment of brilliance, removed the works of the Defence Officer’s telephone ” —- Warrant Officer A. J. Dixon, in The Listener.