© 2014-2024 Offshore Radio Museum
From time to time the Museum mounts a Special Exhibition - to mark a significant anniversary or to explore a particular aspect of offshore radio history.
These Special Exhibitions often contain additional or previously un-used documents or recordings which are not available in the individual Galleries elsewhere in the Museum.
Please click on any of the posters below to visit the Special Exhibitions.
In the early morning of Sunday 3rd March 1968 both Radio Caroline ships - MV Caroline (Caroline North) and MV Mi Amigo (Caroline South) were seized in international waters in a coordinated operation by the Wijsmuller Tug Company following a dispute about unpaid debts.
This Special Exhibition contains a slideshow of photographs marking 50 years since the ships were silenced and the first phase of Radio Caroline’s history came to an abrupt halt.
This is a Special Exhibition to mark 60 years since the pioneering Scandinavian offshore station, Radio Mercur, was launched.
The station’s history is inevitably intertwined with two other stations - Skanes Radio Mercur and DCR - and this Exhibition takes a look at all three stations in a 60 photograph slideshow.
Publicity nostalgia from offshore stations broadcasting during the 1980s
Celebrating the 50th Anniversary of the launch of Radio North Sea International - RNI . This Special Exhibition looks at the period leading up to the official start in February 1970, including aborted plans to use the former Radio London ship, MV Galaxy and the financial assistance given by Radio Veronica.
To mark the 40th anniversary of the most famous rescue assistance in the history of offshore radio – saving the crew of Radio Caroline’s ship, Mi Amigo shortly before she sank off the Essex coast in March 1980 - this Special Exhibition acknowledges support given by Lifeboat services to all the offshore stations in times of trouble.
Lifeboat Assistance Required !!
The offshore radio stations were dependent on regular visits from tenders to deliver supplies, programme material and facilitate crew changeovers.
As time went on, and particularly by the 1980s, many officially organised tender supply runs became less frequent for various reasons.
However, those on board the radio ships often benefited from supplies delivered clandestinely by loyal supporters and in defiance of the law.
This Special Exhibition focuses on one such clandestine supplier - Peter Norcott - who made regular deliveries to Radio Caroline and Laser off the British coast in the mid to late 1980s.
Many fans of the offshore stations visited the radio ships on organised trips and excursions and one of those fans, Peter Craughwell has kindly shared the photos he took on various visits to the stations off the Dutch coast in the early 1970’s.
When Radio Caroline launched in March 1964 it was not only breaking the BBC monopoly on the broadcast of popular music, it was relying on a new way of financing a broadcasting service – programmes funded by commercial advertisements - and at no cost to the listener.
In this Special Exhibition to mark Radio Caroline’s 60th Anniversary we take a look at some of the commercial aspects of “Your All Day Music Station” between 1964 and 1968.
