Digitizing History: Palestine Broadcasting Service, 1936-1948
SPORTS
Based on the British press at the time and still today, sport was left to the back pages. Alexander Alexandrovitch wrote one of the longest standing columns in Hagalgal magazine. His column appeared under the bi-line "100 Lines of Sport." ("Meah Shurot al Sport") . Alexandrovitch also had a regular 5-10 minute weekly Saturday evening slot. The time varied a little but usually around 8:15 PM starting with a news bulletin. There is no way to know today if the column was a supplement to the radio program, or it had material not included in Hagalgal, or both. Hagalgal came out on a Thursday, so most likely the weekly magazine column was actually looking backward to the previous week, and would also include what to look forward to in sport in the week ahead. Hagalgal records Alexandrovitch's first radio broadcast as Saturday, July 29, 1944. But he wasn't the first or only sports commentator. There were others.
SPORTS COMMENTATORS
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Arabic Programs
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Akram Husseini
Sports Talk, 1936
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English Programs
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George Henry Williams (Also known as G. H. Williams)
Mr. G. H. Williams came to Palestine in 1922. Then he served the RAF as a RAF Flight Lieutenant. But he became known to the public after retiring from the airforce when he took up his first known public day job as Secretary, Palestine Police Sports Club, in 1934. He started a weekly Sunday evening radio program for the PBS, in 1936, in English, entitled,"Week-end cricket" and then "Week_End Sports - A commentary by G.H. Williams". He was also master of ceremonies at police boxing in particular the Interservices and Police Boxing Championshipss. He retired from post in May 1939. See Jerusalem's Farewell to Police "Big Four", Palestine Post, May 22, 1939.
In 1938, he presented a new 10 minute sports review entitled, initially at least , "Sports talk", starting , Sunday, August 19, 1938, but changed its name as it became a week from (September 18) to "Playing the Game". The last broadcast was April 23, 1939 .
He also organized and established the First Season of the Jerusalem Services and Police Football League, September 1938 to May 1939.
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Hebrew Programs
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Alexander Alexandrovitch
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Alexander Alexandrovitch
Alexander Alexandrovitch was a sports writer for the PBS magazine "Hagalgal", where he had a weekly column entited "100 Lines of Sport". He also had a weekly broadcast for PBS Radio. Unfortunately, it is not clear if the column he wrote was actually a transcript of the broadcast or completely different. There are no recordings of the radio program, that I know of, that would show one way or another if this was the case or not.
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