part in
the second series of tests planned for December. His expenses were
being paid by the A.R.R.L. which already boasted having 15,000
transmitting members. In the U.S.A. distances of over 2,000 miles
had already been achieved.

During his brief stay of a few hours in London Paul Godley was
introduced to Senator Marconi, to Admiral of the Fleet Sir Henry
Jackson, to Alan A. Campbell Swinton and many other distinguished
members of the Wireless Society of London, as the R.S.G.B. was then
called.

Paul Godley first set up his receiving equipment at Wembley Park,
Middlesex but soon decided that the electrical noises in the area
would not permit reception of the weak transatlantic signals. He
therefore obtained permission to set up the European receiving station
at Ardrossan a coast town near Glasgow, Scotland. The actual site was
a large field heavily covered with seaweed. He was assisted in the
erection of his receiving antenna by a member of the Marconi
International Marine Communications Company. 1,300 feet of
phosphor-bronze wire was stretched 12 feet above the ground on ten
poles spaced equally along the full length of the wire which was
earthed at the far end through a non-inductive resistor. This was the
first Beverage type receiving array ever erected in the United
Kingdom. Before the actual tests took place the length of the wire
was reduced to 850 feet.

At 00.50 GMT on December 9th 1921 Godley identified signals from
1BCG located at Greenwich, Connecticut. The station there was manned by
six members of the Radio Club of America. One of the operators was
E. Howard Armstrong inventor of the regenerative detector,
super-regeneration and the supersonic heterodyne receiver, though the
French claim that the superhet was first designed by Lucien Levy of
Paris.

Two days later the historic first complete message transmitted by
U.S. amateurs and received in Europe on the "short waves" (actually 230
metres) heralded a new era. The message read:

No.1 de 1BCG. WORDS 12. NEW YORK DECEMBER 11 1921. TO
PAUL GODLEY ARDROSSAN SCOTLAND. HEARTY
CONGRATULATIONS. SIGNED BURGHARD INMAN GRINAN ARMSTRONG
AMY CRONKHITE.

Eight British amateurs had also copied the message correctly. One
of them was W.E. "Bill" Corsham 2UV of Willesden, London who was later
credited by the R.S.G.B. and the A.R.R.L. as being the inventor of
the QSL card. Bill had use