Six decades ago, a repurposed ferry embarked on its maiden voyage from the port of Greenore, near Carlingford, initiating an unanticipated rebellion. The sea vessel had been locally retrofitted with various equipment features, the most notable being an enormous mast. When asked by an inquisitive journalist, owner Ronan O’Rahilly explained that the mast would be used for a marine study aimed at identifying “deep-sea sponges”.
However, the actual purpose was to facilitate broadcasting. Shortly thereafter, the ship found itself anchored off the Suffolk coast, in the waters that Britannia had long governed. From this vantage point, MV Caroline became the first pirate radio station in Britain to launch broadcasts on March 28th, 1964, through radio waves which were not clearly defined in terms of jurisdiction.
O’Rahilly’s efforts were indeed revolutionary. His grandfather, Michael J, who liked to refer to himself as “The” O’Rahilly, was one of the founders of the Irish Volunteers and initially opposed the Easter Rising. However, upon hearing of its inevitability, he joined the cause in Dublin.
Facilitated by the property purchases of his offspring at Greenore (including the only port in Ireland not owned by the state) a new generation, represented by Ronan O’Rahilly, set off his peaceful rebellion against British dominance.
These actions were motivated, in part, by a more literal outcry. Struggling to secure radio airtime for the jazz musician Georgie Fame, whom he managed, O’Rahilly became disgruntled with established radio stations (the BBC Light Programme and Radio Luxembourg) that were under the thumb of record companies.
Despite instant popularity with the audience, Caroline soon came under scrutiny from the British government. They frequently showed hostility and made attempts to shut the station down, regardless of its location in international waters.
Conversely, not everyone in Ireland saw O’Rahilly’s revolutionary act as noble. Proinsias MacAonghusa, a campaigning broadcaster for the Kilkenny People, expressed in an April 1964 column that the launching of the new station was simply a pursuit of increased profit, offering no significant contribution to society.
He insinuated that if the UK government or its representatives were to clandestinely sink or destroy Caroline, he doubted informed individuals would deem it an outrageous act. Mac Aonghusa further asserted that despite Caroline’s team managing to outwit the current ineffective British Government, circumstances would drastically change once Mr. Wilson took charge of a fresh Administration at Whitehall.
Harold Wilson stood firm in his belief. When O’Rahilly paid a visit to Westminster, hosted by the Conservative shadow minister Reggie Maudling, Wilson recognised him, pointed at him, and made his views clear: “You’re done.” Nevertheless, Radio Caroline persevered, despite the ship grounding in 1966 without political backing, the battle for advertiser interest, and the radio station’s struggle for survival through diverse forms and different vessels until the 90s, thereafter adopting satellite and other media.
When I stumbled upon it as a teenager in the latter part of the 70s, even in rural Monaghan, pop music was easy to come by courtesy of the BBC’s Radio 1 and RTÉ’s Radio 2 in 1979. However, Caroline had matured to a station streaming album music, a genre we sophisticated youngsters fancied over the horrendous pre-punk singles.
A vivid memory of mine is the euphoric rush I felt when one night, through my parents’ vintage wooden-frame radio, I tuned into an exception but remarkable song by Pink Floyd, a band I had already chosen to follow due to their unique moniker, hairstyle, and album artwork. The song was See Emily Play, curiously a single from 1967 prior to the band abandoning such production. It triggered an ardent juvenile fascination with the band, which I continued to indulge mainly through Radio Caroline until I could gather funds to purchase albums and secretly play them on my sister’s turntable whenever she was away.
I can’t recall any commercials being aired on that channel back in those days. What it did seem to primarily advocate for, was eastern spirituality, a subject of keen interest for O’Rahilly. Listeners were persistently entreated to indulge in “loving awareness” through peculiar jingles. However, the exact way to achieve this was never outlined.
As for Emily, it is often relayed that the inspiration behind the station’s name came from a picture. The photograph depicted a young girl named Caroline Kennedy, enjoying herself through dance in the White House Oval Office, with her presidential father watching on.
This image was in alignment with O’Rahilly’s vision for a nascent radio channel joyfully disrupting those in authority. However, this origin story may just be folklore. A more mundane possibility suggests that the name was actually derived from a popular women’s periodical of the time, which characterised its intended reader as an “unpretentious woman in her twenties who had ceased her education at 16 and was a ‘party girl’ named Caroline”.