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Just part of Leon Tipler's enormous tape archive. Photo courtesy of Steve England.
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When Leon Tipler died, his friend Steve England inherited his extensive tape archive. It was, and still is, a major undertaking to sort and
catalogue all the boxes.
So far Steve has unearthed:
A tape containing recordings made in Clacton of Radio London and other offshore stations in January 1965 (see here);
tapes containing recordings made in May/June 1964 of Radios Caroline and Atlanta (see here and here);
a tape of Radio Scotland recorded in Ayr in July 1966 (see here)
and numerous recordings of the station where Leon worked, Radio 270 (see here).
In February 2024 we heard from Steve again. He had found two more recordings of offshore radio. They were both dated 22nd May 1964 - a Friday - but as DJ Doug Kerr refers to it being a Saturday on the second one we think that
tape is probably from the 23rd. Steve thinks they were recorded at Leon's home in Kidderminster.
Friday 22nd May 1964, 7-8 pm, Radio Atlanta:
When Radio Atlanta began broadcasting in May 1964, most of its output was pre-recorded. The shows were taped in their studios in London. The tapes were played out on the ship by the American father and son,
Bob Scott and Johnny Jackson. These two also presented live shows at the start and end of each day. Listening to them now, one gets the impression that they had a very limited record library on board.
The music seems to consist of US releases from a couple of years earlier, some country & western material and cover versions of current hits released on station boss Allan Crawford's Rocket, Cannon and Sabre labels. On this
recording we hear the end of Bob Scott's show, the 7pm station ident, and an hour of Johnny Jackson. Atlanta closed down each night at 8pm (duration 14 minutes 2 seconds)
Saturday 23rd May, Radio Caroline and Radio Atlanta, from about 8:30am:
As on earlier tapes, Leon switches between Caroline and Atlanta here. We start with Doug Kerr live on Caroline's Early Show. He plays a lot of requests, mainly current releases, and one record
at the wrong speed! At 9 o'clock it is time for Carl Conway with a pre-recorded show. After the Frank Ifield track, Leon re-tunes to Radio Atlanta. Their DJ doesn't mention his name but we think
it is probably Richard Harris with the Musical Mailbag request show. After he plays Gene Pitney, Leon switches back to Caroline. As before, Atlanta has the slightly stronger signal of the two
(duration 5 minutes 46 seconds)
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