The big money stakes potential of 1964 ....

2/26/2021

Everyone knew what was probably under the North Sea, and they had known it since at least the middle of World War II, and possibly much earlier. But there was just one big problem standing in the way of a beginning rush to riches from that gigantic pool of untapped energy:

That problem concerned a lack of technological knowledge which revealed how to access and retrieve that 'black gold' beneath the continental shelf and submerged by the waters of the North Sea. But all that was about to change, and soon the rush would begin to find and then retrieve those resources!

The core issue was not 'pop' music.

It had never been about pop music.

The British pop music industry had begun to come alive long before the 'pirate radio' ships began to appear. No one still wants to admit it, but the Beatles did not need the 'pirate radio' stations - they were already international stars who were leading the way in promoting the booming sound of British youth groups. But championing that cause was none other than the British Broadcasting Corporation who began a concept which had been taken up and exploited by its younger State sister, the Independent Television Authority!

It may be sacrilege to all those who want to invent a memory of a yesterday that never happened, but the BBC and ITA were promoting British recorded music long before daytime commercial radio from offshore stations became a reality! The difference between this fact and their fiction is that the premier means of exploitation in the United Kingdom was not radio, but television. In the USA the story was reversed.

This concept of teen television even had its own mega star named Jack Good. It was his talent that promoted the sound of youth. He took his programing ideas from BBC to ITA, and then across the Atlantic to ABC-TV in the United States of America.

The reason why the so-called history of 'pirate radio' broadcasting (as written and published to date) does not make sense, is because it is a corruption of real events as they happened.

It is interesting that the 'Jimmy Ross' magical diversion did not really begin until Ian Cowper Ross reappeared on the scene in 1990, and it began with his book of nonsense called 'Rocking the Boat'. Yes, his father C. E. Ross had been previously referred to, but only in a vague sort of way where it could be interpreted as being the father of Ian Cowper Ross, and that is all.

In previous editions of this Blog we have told you who 'Mister Ross' of Reynards Wood is. He was a salesman for Jensen Cars of Birmingham. But Mister Ross, the father of Ian Cowper Ross was never referred to as 'Jimmy', and why would he be? If anything, Charles Edward Ross would be called 'Charlie', but never 'Jimmy'.

The mythical 'Jimmy Ross' is the product of Ian Cowper Ross' imagination in order to divert attention away from the real Jimmy in this story. He is the man who is never discussed in these books by idiots for idiots. "Jimmy Ross" never existed, but Jimmy Deterding did, and he is the key to understanding this entire story! We will have a lot more to say about Jimmy Deterding in future editions of this Blog.

Even the 1983 book written by Richard Nichols about 'Radio Luxembourg' downplays a major part of the pre-pirate radio story about popular music heard in Britain. That is because it downplays the advent of Alan Freed on '208' with his transcribed programs recorded in New York City.

Freed was the real pioneer of rock 'n' roll in the United Kingdom, even though he was only heard during 1956 on UK radio receivers. That is when his shows were aired on Saturday nights over 'Radio Luxembourg'. But Freed's real impact came from a long string of rock 'n' roll motion pictures that featured many cameos by the biggest stars of the day, and they were seen on cinema screens throughout the United Kingdom.

What this bevy of balderdash books about 'pirate radio' have in common, is the idea that there were two rival offshore radio stations: 'Radio Atlanta' and 'Radio Caroline'. Readers have been told that these two were engaged in a media war, which 'Radio Atlanta' lost, leaving 'Radio Caroline' as the lone survivor to gobble-up its poor competitor.

To make that idea work there had to be two rival groups backing these two rival stations, and to promote them there would have to be two rival radio station companies. But there was only one.

While details of every offshore radio station that broadcast to Britain in the Sixties is known and documented, it is peculiar that 'Radio Caroline' remains an enigma. In order to fill in the blank spots, Ronan O'Rahilly was hired as an Irishman with enough blarney to instantly recite all manner of stories which British journalists lapped-up, and turned into sensational news stories for their readers. But the fact is that Ronan O'Rahilly was a fraud. O'Rahilly spouted nonsense and to help him he was assisted by Ian Cowper Ross.

If this surge of fake 'Jimmy' stories did not begin until long after 'Radio Caroline' had been dead and buried under the 1967 Marine Offences Act, why did it suddenly get revived in 1990? True, others had come along at various times and called a number of stations broadcasting from boats by the name of 'Radio Caroline', just as there are stations doing the same thing today but from land bases. Only none of them are the real 'Radio Caroline' because it is long gone.

Either the perpetrator of these 'Jimmy' tales had his own reason for promoting his fictitious story, or something else was resurfacing from the Sixties that needed to be reburied. Evidence points to the first scenario, but it also served the purpose of totally burying the original story about who really created 'Radio Caroline', and why it was created.