~Co-presented with the Bolinas Museum~

Point Reyes National Seashore is home to a significant Marconi wireless radio station built in the early 20th Century; Commonweal is based on the transmitting station grounds in an Art Deco structure, built by Marconi’s successor company, RCA. The surviving buildings and antenna fields are now on the National Register of Historic Places. Here, as was Marconi’s dream, the first transoceanic signal, from Bolinas to Hawaii, was achieved in 1914. The history of worldwide wireless radio transmission is more than technological: it launched an age of wireless communication which is still evolving. It contains its own language (Morse code), culture (among radio operators, and as lifelines to ship crews), and overarching sense of purpose.

Join us for a conversation with Carola DeRooy Davis, retired archivist and curator of the Pt. Reyes National Seashore Museum and Archives. Carola and Irwin will discuss the history of the Marconi/RCA stations and their cultural reverberations (including their impact in the development of the town of Bolinas). We will also hear about the tremendous efforts made to ensure preservation of this site, which threw a lifeline to ships at sea and land stations around the world for 84 years.

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