US Army Radio Receiving Station, Capalaba is a heritage-listed former radio receiving station at 362–388 Old Cleveland Road East, in Capalaba (now within Birkdale), City of Redland, Queensland, Australia. It was built from 1942 to 1943. It is also known as the Capalaba receiving station. It was added to the Queensland Heritage Register on 26 June 2020.
History
The former US Army Radio Receiving Station consists of two small buildings and the location of a rhombic radio aerial array in a large, lightly-forested property is located in the suburb of Birkdale, approximately south-east of the Brisbane CBD. Originally farmland, the site was requisitioned by the United States of America (US) Army during World War II (WWII) for the establishment of a vital radio receiving station. Constructed in early 1943 by the US Signal Corps, it became an integral part of the South West Pacific Area (SWPA) Campaign General Headquarters' communications network, under the direction of US Supreme Commander, General Douglas MacArthur. As part of the then technologically advanced global Army Command and Administration Network (ACAN), the US Army Radio Receiving Station was one of the main centres for radio communications during the South West Pacific campaign. The station worked in conjunction with the Hemmant Transmitting Station, located north-west. At war's end, the Australian Post Master General's Department (PMG) took over the station. It continued to be used as a radio receiving and frequency testing facility until its closure in 2017.
Birkdale, originally part of Capalaba, is part of the traditional land of the Quandamooka people. Capalaba was one of the first places in the Moreton Bay district where country land was sold after the separation of Queensland in 1859. Although situated several miles south-east of Brisbane, it was close to Cleveland, the once-favoured port for the colony of Queensland. Due to its fertile agricultural land, it was swiftly settled. A mail service from Brisbane to Cleveland commenced in 1861 and the town of Tingalpa was surveyed on the Brisbane side of Tingalpa Creek in 1863. The land on which the receiving station was eventually established was part of James Willard's 1860s selection. This land was bounded by Tingalpa Creek on the west and by the Cleveland road on the east. Over the years, the property had several owners including Rosemary and Doug Cotton, who purchased the property in 1941.
Although WWII started in September 1939, Australia was under little threat of air attack until late 1941. On 8 December 1941, the United States of America entered the war, following the previous day's bombing of the American fleet at Pearl Harbor by Japanese carrier-borne aircraft. Simultaneously, Japanese forces launched assaults on Thailand, the Philippines and the British colony of Malaya. The sudden fall of Singapore on 15 February 1942 and the rapid Japanese advance through the islands of the Netherlands East Indies (NEI) raised fears of air attacks on Australia. The first Japanese air raid on Darwin occurred on 19 February 1942; Broome, in Western Australia, was attacked on 3 March 1942. Japanese air raids on other targets in Australia seemed likely, and an invasion of Australia was feared.
After the first US forces arrived in Brisbane in the Pensacola Convoy on 22 December 1941, the city became a major supply base and staging point for the war in the South West Pacific. In January 1942, Brisbane became Base Section 3 of the US Army Forces in Australia (USAFIA). After General Douglas MacArthur, Supreme Commander, SWPA, arrived in Brisbane in July 1942, the city also hosted his General Headquarters in the AMP building at the corner of Queen and Edward streets (now part of MacArthur Central). General Sir Thomas Blamey, Commander Allied Land Forces, had his Advanced Land Headquarters at the University of Queensland at St Lucia. Queensland played a major role in the build-up of troops and supplies for the joint US-Australian counter-offensive in New Guinea, which occurred after the Japanese advance was checked at Milne Bay and on the Kokoda track (August–September 1942).
Prior to the United States' entry in the war, the Signal Corps had been developing a technologically advanced global signal beltline to enable secure communications to be sent to bases throughout the world quickly and reliably.George Raynor Thompson, Dixie R Harris, Pauline M Oakes, Dulany Terrett, United States Army in World War II, The Technical Services, The Signal Corps: The Test (December 1941 to July 1943), Office of the Chief of Military History, Department of the Army, Washington DC, 1957, p.429W.O.Reeder, "The Signal Corp - Voice of Command", The Military Engineer, Vol.39, No. 262, August 1947, p.323. The Army Command and Administrative Network, ACAN, was developed in Washington DC by the Signal Corps Army Communications Service. Previously, the main means of signal communication was by Morse code, which was slow and labour intensive.The Western Australian, Monday 26 November 1945, p.8. ACAN used high-speed radio signal transmission over multiple channels, which could send and receive large volumes of military messages to stations established throughout the world.Reeder, "The Signal Corp - Voice of Command", August 1947, p.323. At the centre of ACAN was the Message Centre in Washington, station WAR. With the US entry in the war, work on the global network of stations was swiftly undertaken by the Signal Corps. By mid-1943 major ACAN stations had been established in San Francisco, London, Algiers, Accra, Cairo, Asmara, New Delhi, Hawaii, and Brisbane.George Raynor Thompson and Dixie R Harris, The United States Army in World War II, The Technical Services, The Signal Corps: The Outcome (Mid 1943 Through 1945), Centre of Military History, United States Army, Washington DC, 1991, p.600Thompson, Et al, United States Army in World War II, The Technical Services, The Signal Corps: The Test (December 1941 to July 1943), p.433. Linked to this network were smaller stations radiating radio or wire communications to every outlying command post. Major ACAN stations could make contact with remote areas of the conflict quickly, securely and reliably.Thompson, Et al, United States Army in World War II, The Technical Services, The Signal Corps: The Test (December 1941 to July 1943), p.582. At the time, ACAN was hailed "the greatest unified military communications system ever developed", and only the US Army had it.Reeder, "The Signal Corp - Voice of Command", August 1947, p.324.
Central to ACAN was the use of semi-automatic radioteletype machines. These machines revolutionised signal communications. By using high-powered, single-sideband transmitters (another innovation), messages could be sent and received between ACAN stations. The message was typed on a keyboard that produced a print out of the message while a tape was perforated with the cryptic message, fed into an enciphering machine and on to the radio transmitter. The message was then sent via powerful radio waves to the receiving point, where a second teletype machine automatically enciphered the message onto perforated tape. The last step of the process automatically printed the message on a sheet of paper. The system was capable of sending one message to multiple ACAN stations, as well as being able to send multiple messages out simultaneously on the one channel. It was fast, reliable and most importantly, secure. This technology also enabled teletypewriter conferences between major command centres. With the use of a projection screen, the typed incoming message could be displayed to a group within a room, who could then respond immediately. In 1944, a round-the-world message was recorded as taking only 3.5 minutes.Thompson, Et al, United States Army in World War II, The Technical Services, The Signal Corps: The Test (December 1941 to July 1943), p.220Thompson, Et al, The United States Army in World War II, The Technical Services, The Signal Corps: The Outcome (Mid 1943 Through 1945), p.580-582 and p.586Laurence J Murray, Use of High Frequency Radio Systems During and After World War II, with special reference to Redland City, Capalaba, Brisbane City, Hemmant, Queensland, Australia, Laurence J Murray, April 2017, p.32Mail, 31 January 1948, p.24.
The ACAN network established major stations on an equatorial beltline, which included the United States, Australia, China, India, Africa, and the Middle East. This was deemed preferable to stations closer to the poles, where magnetic interference weakened radio waves. Following the loss of the Philippines' Manila ACAN station (WTA) in early 1942, Australia's first ACAN station was installed in Melbourne, where General Headquarters, South West Pacific was initially established. By June 1942, plans for the relocation of the ACAN station from Melbourne (Base Section 4) to Brisbane (Base Section 3), and the establishment of the Capalaba receiving station were underway.National Archives of Australia, "Letter from Lt. Col. Grable, US Signal Corps to Director General, Posts and Telegraph", 29 June 1942, requesting the Posts and Telegraph office of the PMG supply aerial wires for "our new receiving station [Capalaba]".Remote Control Lines - United States Forces - United States Forces Transmitting Station Redland Bay - Receiving station Capalaba, Series No. MP721/1, Item No. W495-9, 1942-1945. Once the US Army moved to Brisbane, the Melbourne ACAN station at Rockbank, Victoria, was handed over to the Australian Army. The receiving station building was not a brick structure as the Capalaba station was, instead it was an igloo. Soon after, the Brisbane station, WVJJ (later WTO) replaced Melbourne's station, WTJJ.Thompson, Et al, The United States Army in World War II, The Technical Services, The Signal Corps: The Outcome (Mid 1943 Through 1945), pp.599-600Thompson, Et al, United States Army in World War II, The Technical Services, The Signal Corps: The Test (December 1941 to July 1943), p.468'Former Army Radio Station, Diggers Rest, Victorian Heritage Database Report, https://vhd.heritagecouncil.vic.gov.au/places/30040/download-report Accessed 9 March 2020.
Base Section 3 headquarters was swiftly established at Somerville House, a requisitioned private girls' school in South Brisbane. A central ACAN station was installed to ultimately link all communication signal lines in Brisbane, including secret military intelligence, to General MacArthur's headquarters in the city. Once all the Brisbane ACAN stations were complete, MacArthur had direct, swift and secure communication with Washington DC and other major international ACAN stations.Thompson, Et al, The United States Army in World War II, The Technical Services, The Signal Corps: The Outcome (Mid 1943 Through 1945), p.600.
Conducive to clearer reception, ACAN stations were generally built on swampy ground that provided an earth mat for antennas. Ideally, the stations were constructed well away from built-up areas to limit signal interference.Murray, Use of High Frequency Radio Systems During and After World War II, with special reference to Redland City, Capalaba, Brisbane City, Hemmant, Queensland, Australia, p.19. In the Brisbane area, several sites were requisitioned by the US Army for the ACAN network. Land at Capalaba (now Birkdale), Redland Bay, Hemmant and Rocklea was chosen. The majority of land on what was known as Willard's farm, at Capalaba, was requisitioned by the US Army in 1942 for the establishment of the Capalaba receiving station. The site was relatively isolated and swampy, with Tingalpa Creek as the western boundary.