I was just reading this and thought its an interesting enough story about how some early military stations came into existence. It's from the Department of Defense published book HISTORY of AFRTS - "THE FIRST 50 YEARS", read online or freely downloadable pdf at: https://www.google.com/books/edition/History_of_AFRTS_the_First_50_Years/05TfAAAAMAAJ?hl=en
Excerpts from page 6:
PHILIPPINE BEGINNINGS
It was not until February, 1939, that KGEI in San Francisco began beaming shortwave broadcasts to the Philippines with programming oriented to the U.S. military.(8)
KGEI had its origins as a General Electric G.E. Company exhibit at the 1939 Golden Gate International Exposition held on Treasure Island in San Francisco Bay.
The company had developed a state-of-the-art shortwave transmitter equipped with an antenna that could beam broadcasts either west to Asia or south to LatinAmerica from the Exposition's House of Magic.
The only problem was that General Electric had no programming for the station to air. When Buck Harris, the company's public relations representative at the Exposition, pointed out the deficiency, G. E. gave him the job of manning the facility and of developing programming. Their only guidance for Harris was to broadcast unbiased news and music to Asia four hours a day, to Latin America three hours a day, and to develop good will. (9)
As a journalist with no radio experience, Harris approached his job much as an editor would running a newspaper city desk. He used news from the wire
services and music from transcriptions. He interviewed foreign dignitaries from the Orient or Latin America who visited the Exposition. Almost immediately, cablegrams reception and expressing appreciation for the news and music. Listeners further encouraged KGEI to serve as a counterpoint to the Japanese Radio Tokyo that broadcast throughout Asia.
Ultimately, KGEI became the model for
theU.S. Government's own shortwave news and entertainment efforts following Pearl Harbor. (10)
... ...
During the fight for the Philippines, KGEI became the primary source of news and information for MacArthur's men as they waged their losing battle against the Japanese invaders. Using a 1,000-watt transmitter taken from Manila, the American troops set up a small station on Bataan. From there they picked up and then rebroadcast news and entertainment beamed from KGEI in San Francisco. When MacArthur moved his headquarters to Corregidor at the end of December, his men brought the transmitter along. (12)
... ....
U. S. MILITARY BROADCAST BEGINNINGS
While MacArthur's "Voice of Freedom" is an important part of early AFRTS history, it was not the first United States military radio station. By the time it began broadcasting from Corregidor in January, 1942, soldiers in the Panama Canal Zone and Alaska had already put stations on the air.
The first station in Panama began as a purely military requirement. ... ... For communication between the headquarters and the artillerymen scattered throughout the country, the Command used several "picnic type"
radio receivers. They located the transmitter for the alert system in the basement of the Panama Coast Artillery Command barracks at Quarry Heights in the Canal Zone.
However, the command quickly discovered that either the units in the field were turned off or the soldiers weren't monitoring the radios. Either way, it was impossible to call test alerts. (16)
As editor of the Panama Coast Artillery News, the local service paper, Sergeant Wayne Woods received a request from the Artillery Command. They needed "maximum publicity" to keep the radios in the field turned on.
Woods discussed the problem with Technical Sergeant Joseph Whitehead, who was in charge of the radio transmitter, and with Master Sergeant Paul Doster, the command Public Relations NCO. The three servicemen
cameup with an idea. They'd play popular music over the air. Surely, the troops in the outlying positions would be more likely to listen to the radio if it provided entertainment. (17) Major General Sanderford Jarman, Commanding General of the PCAC, liked the idea. He gave the recommendation his "wholehearted approval" and instructed
the troop morale officer to get the necessary recordings.
Early in 1940, broadcasts began on a regular schedule with Whitehead in charge of the project. The station,
manned by three full-time operators, took PCAC as its call letters. (18)
PCAC soon took on an additional function. General Jarman wanted more news about current world developments reaching his men in the jungle. With the budding radio station in place, he asked Woods to read news copy over the air.
As Woods recalls, the first newscast consisted of his reading the Panama Star and Herald, a local morning paper. Each weekday, one of the NCO's read the major stories from the paper. On Sunday, the staff produced a half-hour newscast summarizing the week's news based on stories from the current Time magazine.(19)
In the beginning, the station operated on a hit-and-miss basis with little idea about what the next day's broadcast schedule would be. Nonetheless, by April, 1941, the morale of the troops had improved remarkably as a result of the music and news. The Panama Coast Artillery News began to provide operating funds to the station to ensure regularly scheduled programming.
NETWORK PROGRAM BEGINNINGS
As the station became more and more popular among the troops and civilians in the Canal Zone, Master Sergeant Doster, the Public Relations NCO, suggested that the staff get stateside programs to air. Woods had the same idea and he had been in correspondence with members of the radio and motion picture communities. Therefore, he undertook the assignment of writing letters to such radio notables as Jack Benny, Bing Crosby and Bob Hope asking for transcriptions of their broadcasts. According to Woods, the "replies were spontaneous." JackBenny, for one, offered regular transcriptions at no charge. His program, on an autographed disk, became the first network show to be broadcast. (20)