Swinging Radio England

Swinging Radio England ("SRE") was a top 40 offshore commercial station billed as the "World's Most Powerful" that operated from 3 May to 13 November 1966 from a ship in the North Sea, three and a half miles off Frinton-on-Sea, Essex, England. While the station was dubbed a pirate radio station, its operation took place within the law and its offices were in the West End of London.

While it only lasted a few months Swinging Radio England had a major impact in the history of UK radio. After all, who would know Peter Dingley today if it wasn't for SRE.

Peter Dingley was born on 30th March 1945. After leaving Solihull public school at the age of 15, he worked as a second-hand car salesman and disco DJ under the name “Peter Dee.” He joined “Swinging” Radio England at its start in May 1966 but was told he would have to change his name as Peter Dee was too similar to that of another DJ, Roger Day. He chose his new identity from a tape of American radio jingles and became “Johnnie Walker.”

SRE was a slick station, like Radio London, had fresh professional “Pams” jingles. It was intended to be an auto pilot station, but plans were changed at the last minute, so when it went on air, the onboard “Boss Jocks” didn't even have cabins to sleep in. Unlike Big L, SRE was a commercial disaster. It's sales side was run by a company with experience in selling cinema ad space, but had no idea how to sell air time, so with little money coming in, the station closed in November 1966, and the ship sailed off to Holland. Having said all that, it had a great sound, with it's jingles copied and adapted for Radio Caroline South.

Radio England started broadcasting on
May 3rd 1966 from the ship Laissaz Faire formally the Olga Patricia. The station ran only until November 1966 when the money ran out. She sailed to the Netherlands coast and as a Dutch station began broadcasting as Radio Dolphin.

Radio England called their format Boss radio borrowed from WFUN in the USA but was nothing like it. The WFUN version was laid back (similar to Caroline in the 70s) whereas Swinging Radio England was brash, with loads of echo and very fast talking.

Radio England shared the ship with “The Hallmark of Quality” Britain Radio and was dogged by problems from the start. .Frequencies chosen were wrong based on the American 10 KHz spacing instead of the European 9KHz spacing. It was unique in the world of Radio, and was way ahead of its time. Its listeners loved it the advertisers did not however share their enthusiasm.
Now fast forward to 2006. I wanted to start an a offshore tribute station on the internet, but needed a name. Radio England was the choice, why ?
The original Swinging Radio England was to be automated, now on the internet it is. The original Swinging Radio England was the first to have 2 stations on one ship, we were the first to have 2 stations on one computer running one software.

So if you've just found us here on StreamNet TV then welcome back to Swinging Radio England.

You can email me mike.allen@mail.org or visit my blog http://radio-england.blogspot.com.

Mike Allen 2009.