RNI, OR SHOULD I SAY GRONINGEN OFFSHORE MEMORIES
HANS KNOT
OUR PRIDE, THE MARTINI TOREN IN GRONINGEN. FOR GRUNNINGERS MARTSINITSOORN.
My best friend since 1970, Paul Jan de Haan, asked me to write the next chapter on his marvellous website with my view on RNI. It’s better to take a more brighter view on offshore radio and maybe at a later stage I will come back to the real RNI.
But first more to the connections we, PP and TV have. Oh yeah, you’ve got to know we used other names than our own in the more experimental periods of our radio work. But that’s a thing we don’t mention complete. So simple PP and TV. I met Paul at my parents home in Groningen, early 1970. Another friend of mine, Ate Harsta, brought him on the Vespa scooter, which Paul loved at that time. Three men from Groningen, which is called ‘the offshore city of the world’. I do see you thinking "the man is going ´nuts´ by saying so".
Well during this chapter of Marine Broadcasters I will raise my hand ‘now and then’ and tell you why we do think so. Ate thought Paul had to meet me as I was then, now 33 years ago, already addicted to radio. Yes, I know that’s a long time and I’ve talked with several psychiatrics and psychologist during those years, but non of them had a reason to get me of that addiction. Not even Dr. Martin van der Ven did. Martin was still at school at those days and did only know me from a very distance at that time. Well Paul did see me first at the Goudlaan 613, at my parents house. Again I do see you thinking ‘I know this address’. I agree, probably it’s still on your wall or in you small archive as some well-known offshore posters from the seventies carry that address at ‘the address for the Pirate Radio News’. I think it’s time to raise your hands again!
Pirate Radio Magazine was born in 1969 and edited at first by Wim Herrebrugh and Dick van Schenk Brill. Soon Jacob van Kokswijk (Kokje) and I came in and together we brought it to a stencilled cheap magazine, which was read in 21 countries all around the world up to Japan.
I say, raise your hands again!! Groningen is the offshore town in the world as at the Gorechtkade, one of the then modern streets of the city, in 1967 at a wall in the firebreak another friend painted the famous words ‘Big L on 266’. And this words still can be seen there in 2003.
Well Paul came in as a perfect stranger, shook hands with my parents, smoked cigarettes from an American brand and was very friendly.
Only my mother thought he was a little strange because, at his age, he was a little bit too serious and a little bit too much a gentleman. Yes, I know I was a little bit long haired and was living in a mini hippy world. But young Paul told also stories about what he had done lately. He had visited with one of his Vespa friends the MV Fredericia (yes we knew already that this was the only correct spelling and we had to fight for years that the name was spelled as we did and not as was printed everywhere).
Paul and his Irish Wolfhound he was not allowed to name Caroline, but Saar is a nice name too.
Yes, young Paul (I think Rusling stole this from Paul de Haan) had been on the radio ships in Amsterdam and Zaandam harbour. There he was almost locked inside the Fredericia, but that’s a story he can better write himself. On the first meeting he told, to the shock of my late mother, that he had taken a lot of material with him, including mini posters where unique tshirts for Caroline North were promoted.
Stolen from a ship, my mother couldn’t believe it, my father had a big smile on his face as he did some rare things during World War 2, too. Years later I did met one of the former crewmembers of Radio Caroline North and then I realised myself why Paul did go to search the Fredericia. A one time captain was keeping his own small chicken farm on the ship and as ‘De Haan’ means ‘cock’ he was searching for his favourite chicken.
Well, Paul and I did met up again soon afterwards. First at the house of his mother at the Hora Siccama singel in Groningen. I was astonished as through the house all kind of cables were hanging around which was for Paul a good reason to explain that this was to get better reception of radio stations. He then showed me, as I did when he met at our house, his collections of memorabilia as well as his then fiancée Marianne.
Well from that point on we knew we could be good friends and till today we do see each other when possible and of course we share a lot, including our love for R A D I O. Should we raise hands again Paul? Yes Groningen is the Offshore City of the World. Why? Well RNI closed down in September 1970 and again there were some people who thought the city with about 170.000 inhabitants at the time. had a reborn RNI far before Meister and Bollier thought the station deserved a restart in 1971.
In those days we had a lot of AM and FM pirates in Holland and a select group of persons in Groningen made a commercial program. Yes I know, it was low profile and it never became known to me if the butcher paid the bill for the commercial. The station was called RNI Groningen and the transmissions were in English. It was transmitted from a house at the Helperwestsingel in Groningen. (Yes Paul did aske me to write a story on RNI and so I thought to include this). All the station did was playing the finest sounds around, the deejays playing as they were the real RNI deejays and fooling around with the RCD. This stands for the authority which was responsible for catching the stations which were illegally on air.
One afternoon, I think Ate was on the air, suddenly a ring was given at the door. Elvis was singing but not for long anymore. Everyone was distressed and Paul was the one who picked up the transmitter and put it away in the coal pen on the balcony. Lucky, we thought as the people of the RCD (The Dutch equivalent of the DTI) wanted to catch us. RNI Groningen, they knew, came from this house and they also knew exactly which songs were played during the past 15 minutes. And do you know what Paul did? He brought the transmitter into the room again and a dream was over. RNI, where in the world next to the international waters was a station in 1970 with that name? In the offshore town of the world called Groningen. The owner of the house, A.R. was punished but later twice made name in offshore radio land.
photo Ed Simeone
Oh, before I forget, I have to mention the name RNI again and again. Elsewhere Paul thinks I’m not writing the correct story. Do you know any radio station in the world, which got the consecration from a Catholic Bishop and a Jewish Rabbi? Paul and I do. Why? Well it was in 1969 in Groningen harbour, before the MV Cito or the Peace ship left for international waters, that Bishop Möller from Groningen and Rabbi Soetendorp both baptised the ship as a ‘God Bless You’ to Abe Nathan. Yes Raise your hand for also Abe’s success story started in Groningen. He knew then that he had bought a special ship as the MV Cito was the very last Dutch coaster which was built before World War II in 1939 and fled away just a few days before World War II broke out.
photo Ed Simeone
RNI, RNI, Radio Northsea International.Goudlaan 613, was many floors high at the western end of the City. You couldn’t come on the roof, only if you knew how to be very friendly to the caretaker. Well on this roof you could tune in to the FM frequency of RNI sometimes during good conditions. And believe it or not, when we received signals, people in some parts of Western Holland couldn’t . Yes we do raise our hands again.
RNI deejays? No, I can’t remember anyone of them coming from the offshore radio town in the world. We can only mention that Carl Mitchell, a deejay from Caroline International, worked in the period before he went to RNI in Discotheque ‘De Berenkuil’ in Groningen. But Groningen has some memorable people who were born here and made their career in radio. Of course we could mention Paul de Haan and myself but there are more. What about Krijn Torringa (Bob from Bob and Brenda on Radio Veronica), Will Luikinga from the same
station and not forgetting our own Marc Jacobs. As a 15 year old boy he made contact with me to talk about his experience with listening to radio. Some years later I invited him to present programs at the Hospital Radio station and again years later he became big. Rob van Dam, as his real name is, became big in Belgium, Spain, Holland and some parts of England as the most popular deejay Radio Mi Amigo had in the seventies. Even his mother, Moeder Jacoba, was known in offshore radio world. She still lives in Groningen. Raise your hands!!
I also want to tell you about the Oosterhamrikkade in Groningen. Just 500 metres away from the Korreweg, where I lived the first 21 years of my life. Not only the Cito was lying there for some months, also the Zeevaart did. Yes, once again a beautiful coaster from Groningen.
It was in a bankruptcy and Paul Harris and Timmy Thomasson went to Groningen to buy this ship for a scrap price and started Capitol Radio with it. Raise your hands!! Timmy, originally from Canada, still lives at his old address in Bussum (yes, you know him too from the International Society of Broadcasters)
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And well we could go on for ages. Maybe someday Paul and I will write down some hilarious moments in our radio lives, who knows. But next time I’m back on this site I will reflect me on facts, figures and people from RNI.
Of course Groningen could get in the news in a bad way too. During 1973 and 1978 there were two publications in Dutch Newspaper Telegraaf, in which the earlier mentioned A.R. told about his Mi Amigo. In the first publication Anton Rabeljee (as his complete name is) told the reporter that he had bought the radio ship and he would exploit it as a floating casino in international waters. In July 1978 he called the same reporter. Poor Bert Voorthuijsen of the Telegraaf wrote again down all the info without checking it first. A. R. told him that time he had bought the Mi Amigo and would restart the radio station. Well, A.R lived already for many years on social money from the government and was just using his thumb. Anton Rabeljee came from Groningen. But please, don’t raise your hand.
One other incident (yes we do just mention a few of the many) which made the pages was in the summer of 1981. I was invited to go as specialist on offshore radio to a new radio ship on the North Sea. I was asked by some journalist to guide them and so a reporter of the Vrije Volk en one of the Volkskrant joined us, me and Ate Harsta, to Scheveningen harbour. We did find the anchorage of the Radio Paradijs ship. It was a sunny day, but on the ship we didn’t see anyone and we made some pictures. We thought to surprise the above mentioned Bert Voorthuisen at the Telegraaf newspaper. On deck of the Magda Maria, as the ship was called, some big cable boxes were standing. Looking from the air it could have been like seeing a big satellite dish.
So back in Groningen, Ate phoned the Telegraaf and told that the new station would bring the signal up to satellite as the first in Europe. A plane was sent to the ship to make some pictures and yes, the story was printed. There were satellite dishes on the Magda Maria. We knew better and had fun. Anyway raise your hands again, for also this came from Groningen.
And finally remember that since 1969 here in Groningen, some 20.000 pages with information have been filled on the subjects ‘radio and the other media’ , whereby the main subject was offshore radio. Nowhere in the world so many books on this subject have been written about Marine Broadcasters. Where was for a long period the address for Pirate Radio News in the Sixties and Seventies? Yes, in Groningen. Where is the final editor – since 1978 of the Freewave Media Magazine, living? Yes, Groningen. Where are the men from the Marine Broadcasters Site, Paul and Mark de Haan living? In Groningen. Where does the international news report on radio – which can be seen on several sites on internet each month, coming from: Yes from Groningen!
I invite you to raise your hand an point them to the direction of the North East of Holland and say it loud (we’re proud) there’s Groningen, the offshore city of the world. ‘ Er gaat niets boven Groningen’ ‘ Nothing beats Groningen’
Hans Knot.
Note from Paul: We don't want to upset non Groningers, so Leeuwarden, Assen, Zwolle,Arnhem, Utrecht, Amsterdam, Den Haag, Middelburg, Eindhoven, Maastricht, De Haan<Belgium> and Paramaribo are great cities too.