Echo of BBC’s first broadcast in Scotland 100 years ago is heard from centenary event at Pacific Quay

An echo of the BBC’s first broadcast in Scotland 100 years ago today has been picked up internationally by radio amateurs in a special event to mark the centenary.

From an attic in Bath Street, Glasgow, on 6 March, 1923, John Reith, the general manager of the British Broadcasting Company – as it was then known – announced that “5SC was calling”.

That was the callsign for listeners to Station 5SC - a radio service which launched the broadcaster’s programming in Scotland.

And to celebrate the anniversary, the BBC Amateur Radio Group and West of Scotland Amateur Radio Society have been running an event which features the original callsign for that first audience who were listening on their crystal radio sets.

More than 300 fellow radio amateurs from 37 different countries as far afield as India, China and Brazil have made contact via the special event callsign - GB5SC - on radio bands HF, VHF, UHF and the geostationary amateur satellite QO-100.

The callsign event has been running from a temporary radio base on the fifth floor of BBC Scotland’s Pacific Quay centre since Saturday, 4 March. Andy Britton, Engineering Manager, BBC Scotland, says: "We’re delighted with the responses we’ve received from so many countries. We had no idea how much interest there would be when we planned the event, but it has been a great success."

Tim Davie, BBC Director General, who was visiting BBC Scotland as part of the centenary celebrations, met BBC Scotland apprentices and radio amateurs at the temporary radio base and sent out a 5SC call which John Reith had announced a century before.

The centenary of the BBC in Scotland is being celebrated with a range of activities and content including a landmark documentary. Presented by Kaye Adams, Tuned In: 100 years of Scottish Broadcasting, on Sunday, 12 March on the BBC Scotland channel is an archive-rich look at the decades of programming and the broadcaster’s place in Scotland’s cultural life.