Radio Garden Lets You Tune Into A World Of Global Broadcasts

"Before my family bought a television set, it was radio that I stayed glued to. I must have been 10 years old, or maybe 9. My grandfather, uncle and I would sit close to a massive analogue radio. One of them delicately held the dial between the thumb and the index finger, fine-tuning, ear close to the speaker, listening carefully for a clear sentence of English amid the sizzle and the crackle of radio signals. A clear signal that lasted for barely a minute put a huge smile on our faces."

"Back in the late 1970s, the rectangular machine was our window into the world, a world we had never been to."

"Sometimes I listened to a cricket commentary for a game played in New Zealand, Or the news from BBC London. Every once in a while the radio caught a station that wasn't English, but I listened anyway. A foreign language from thousands of miles away — how exotic!"

"This week I stumbled upon a new website on the Internet called Radio Garden. Curious, I clicked on it and a globe started spinning before my eyes. It looked similar to Google Earth. Then I zoomed into the northeast part of the United States. And then a radio station started playing. On the bottom left side of the screen it said, Lewiston, United States. This is about 30 miles from Brunswick, Maine, where I now live. On the bottom right side, it said WRBC. The Bates College radio station was playing."