There was no dedicated news programme in the early days of Irish radio.
There was no regular news reporting on 2RN, the new Irish state radio service. Programming consisted primarily of live and recorded music, talks, Irish language lessons, women’s and children’s programmes, drama and poetry.
The fledgling radio station was run on a very tight budget and did not have the resources needed to enter into agreements with international news agencies.
Nancy Bergin was working in 2RN at that time and recalls how newspaper journalists were employed on a casual basis. The weather forecast was received daily by telegram, and there were also items of interest sent in by regional reporters.
There was the occasional scoop, however. 2RN was first to report a sighting of Charles Lindbergh’s plane in 1927, when the pioneering solo aviator flew over Ireland to Paris from New York.
By 1929, interest in 2RN was growing steadily, as was the increase in complaints about the station’s news output and accusations of bias. The most frequent complaints related to the range and the quality of the news.
And while politicians did not take the 2RN news output seriously in its first few years, by the mid-1930s, attitudes were changing. One early adapter was Taoiseach Éamon De Valera, whose St Patrick’s Day speech on Radio Athlone (as the station was then called) was relayed, via London, to the United States.
'Here Is The News: 50 Years Of Irish Radio’ was broadcast on 4 April 1976. The presenter is Maurice Manning and the producer is Kevin O’Connor.
