The Colombian radio celebrates its 80th anniversary this year. In 1929 the South American nation began its first experiences of radio broadcasting in Barranquilla. HJN (after Radiodifusura Nacional,) was officially founded on September 5 but it had to wait some months to be on air. On December 8 the HKD signal transmitted a match of soccer and it is considered the first radio program in the Colombian territory, though it was listened by a small group of persons.
Barranquilla is the city of pioneers. In the same place was founded the first world airline in 1919 with the Germans Kaemerer, Hosie and Tietjen and the Colombians Cortissoz, Palacio, Restrepo, Correa and Noguera. It was named Colombian-German Society of Aerial Transport that today is Avianca.
The Colombian Elias Pellet Buitrago, the grandson of an American diplomatic, founded HKD or Voz de Barranquilla in the house of his mother in the Caribbean capital.
He made the first transmission in the history of the country after the Ministry of Post and Telegraphs (what is today the Ministry of Communications) gave him the due license.
At the time few persons listened the transmission because there were not enough radio receptors. However, the position of Barranquilla at the side of the Caribbean Basin made that the signal reached Central American countries in short wave.
Pellet Buitrago invited to his house some important personalities of the city to listen the program. In the beginning, sport, music and political debates were the main subjects of what would be the Colombian radio.
According to the relation of Caracol Radio, in 1930 was founded in Bogotá La Voz de Víctor and La Voz de Bogotá, both private. As radio became a sophisticate Media of some privileged families, the municipality of the capital installed receptors in Plaza Bolívar. The idea made that many people gathered to listen the programs.
1931 was the boom of radio stations in Colombia thanks to a new law on broadcasting. They opened stations in Boyacá, Antioquia, the Coffee Axes and Cali. The radio networks or agencies of radio were born in the 1940s and they developed very soon with the investment of big companies.
Radio has been since then one of the most important Medias of Colombia. It is also outstanding in the Latin American context as one of the most modern and professional. Colombian radio can be listened in many countries of the hemisphere as far as Miami and Buenos Aires. At the same time, the entire national territory is covered by several radio stations in AM and FM from big networks to local and independent stations. Although the influence of powerful radio networks like RCN (National Radio Network) and Caracol Radio, there are thousands of local radio stations in any genre of programs from music, news, reports, sport and even religious programs. However, many small stations ended to be engulfed by the big networks.
The development of the Internet has opened big opportunities for radio in the country. It is possible to find a big spectrum of digital radio stations on the Internet, of course, from the big networks to local and small ones.
Radio is a Media of democracy in a country like Colombia, although complains has been always the manipulation by a small group of powerful networks. However, Internet is opening new gates for a more independent expression of radio through the digital world in a country like Colombia. Even the critics to the big networks (in our modern world several countries have their own big networks too), they have become also an important space for dialogue.
Colombian radio has been done exclusively in Spanish, while experience of radio in the dialects of the minority groups or foreign languages like English or Portuguese, is rare and ignored.
Last November, Pel Sxám Estereo, an indigenous radio station of the Pioyá shelter, was awarded by Semana Magazine and Petrobras in the National Prize of Journalism for their commitment in reporting from a conflict area in the Cauca State. The radio station is one of the little experiences of indigenous radio in Colombia.
The Colombian radio is one of the best Hispanic radios in America. I listen it and I find it very international. Congratulations to all over there in Colombia.
Elias Pellet Buitrago, “La Vox De Barranquilla,” was the grandson of Elias Pellet, American vice-consul in Barranquilla from 1893-1899.
Major Elias Pellet was an well-known American Civil War officer and author of the History of the 114th New York Volunteers, the “famous fighting” regiment from New York. He wrote numerous articles for the newspapers during the civil war.
Do you have any other information on Major Elias Pellet and his grandson, Elias Pellet Buitrago. I am researching a book on the 114th New York and would like to explain what Elias Pellet did in Barranquilla.
Thank you.
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