science

Orkney Wireless Museum

Orkney Wireless Museum is a science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Orkney Wireless Museum rather than just read about it. In short: The Orkney Wireless Museum in Kirkwall, Orkney, Scotland, houses a collection of domestic and military wireless equipment. It developed from the private collection of the late Jim MacDonald from St Margaret's Hope and marks the importance of wireless communications in Orkney during World War II.

Key takeaways

Orkney Wireless Museum belongs to science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Orkney Wireless Museum to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Orkney Wireless Museum from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

The Orkney Wireless Museum in Kirkwall, Orkney, Scotland, houses a collection of domestic and military wireless equipment. It developed from the private collection of the late Jim MacDonald from St Margaret's Hope and marks the importance of wireless communications in Orkney during World War II.

Museum The Orkney Wireless Museum is located at Kiln Corner, Kirkwall in Orkney and is run on an entirely voluntary basis. It is registered as a Charitable Company. The Friends of the museum, from all over the world, help raise funds for the museum. The local branch of the society organises volunteers to man the Museum every day of the season, from April to September. The displays and photographic archive bear testament to the strategic and military importance of Orkney during World War II. In the collection there is much reference to the Home Fleet in Scapa Flow, Orkney. The museum demonstrates the importance of wireless communications and radar to the civilian and military populations. The Amateur Radio call sign GB2OWM is frequently activated at the museum. During the Orkney Science Festival every September, worldwide contacts are made and QSL cards are subsequently exchanged with the stations contacted.

Exhibits

The museum has an extensive collection of early domestic radio and wartime communications equipment. Most of the equipment was built in the UK and US. The museum also houses early advertising and posters. An archive of photographs depicts wartime forces and includes coverage of the building of the Churchill Barriers which were built primarily as naval defences to protect the anchorage at Scapa Flow. Some examples of exhibits:

No. 19 Tank Set early recording equipment e.g. The Recordon dictating machine made by Thermionic Products Ltd of England – features a flat, magnetically coated paper disk. example of 1930s Ardent hearing aid a working crystal set (made about 1912) with the crystal/cat's whisker detector clearly visible. Visitors may put the headphones on and listen to BBC Radio Scotland. original Scapa Flow boom defence chart U-boat radio spy Suitcase Radio radios used as Y-stations by Y-service operators photographic archive of life in "Fortress Orkney" domestic wireless receivers made in the US by companies such as Emerson Radio, Weston, Philco wireless receivers made in the UK by companies such as EKCO.

Museum history Jim MacDonald had a love of wireless sets and gathered an extensive and varied collection of domestic and military wireless equipment. The Museum was founded in 1983 when he was persuaded to display his collection in what he called "An Orkney Wireless Museum" in the family home in St Margaret's Hope, South Ronaldsay. After he died of cancer in 1988, his family carried out his wishes to develop the museum. In June 1990 a registered family Trust was set up to run the museum. In 1994, the Museum was admitted as a member of the Museums and Galleries Commission of Great Britain. The Museum was awarded a Certificate from the Royal Naval Amateur Radio Society "For work in collecting, preserving and displaying the radio and electronic heritage of Scapa Flow and the Orkney Isles" In 1997, the collection moved to Kiln Corner, Kirkwall which allowed a greater number of exhibits to be displayed. The Museum has received many financial donations.

Founder James "Jim" MacDonald (1927–1988) was born and brought up on South Ronaldsay. He was locally educated and served his apprenticeship as an electrician and radio repairman. During his boyhood, wireless was rapidly developing and he started to gather old, interesting sets which were becoming redundant. This became the nucleus for his collection which includes such rare and interesting examples as "Kit Sets" and the very, very expensive models by such famous names as Marconi, Cossor, MacMichael, K.B., Lowe and Amplion. With the outbreak of war in 1939, he was listed as in a reserved occupation, and worked for the War Office as a civilian in the great Naval Base at Lyness. He was also employed at other RAF sites such as Netherbutton, with one of the world's first active operational radar installations. (This was actually the prototype, modified, which was shipped from England, as the one being built for Orkney was not nearly ready. When Orkney's was finished, it was sent to Dover where it was to play such a vital role in the Battle of Britain). After the war, Jim collected as many examples of relevant equipment as he could; many operations were still classified as Top Secret. Another problem to collection was that equipment was deliberately destroyed in order to prevent flooding the market with surplus goods (as had happened after the First World War). The collected equipment had played a vital part in the Battle of the Atlantic and North Sea, and has all seen active service.

References

Hodge, A., (2006) War & Peace in Living Orkney magazine, Sep-2006 Orkney Wireless Museum" (publicity leaflet) printed at The Orcadian Ltd., Hatston, Kirkwall, Orkney – 14804. Brewster, R. (August 2005). "Orkney Wireless Museum". Retrieved 22 August 2009. "Naval Museums and Preserved Warships 2000–2001". Fleet Air Arm Archive 1939–1945. Archived from the original on 25 September 2009. Retrieved 22 August 2009.

External links Orkney Wireless Museum Official Website Netherbutton Radar Masts – photograph from Orkney Wireless Museum plus some historical comment Video of a visit to the museum

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Orkney Wireless Museum

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Orkney Wireless Museum claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Orkney Wireless Museum before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Orkney Wireless Museum ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Orkney Wireless Museum

In research: Orkney Wireless Museum appears in science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Orkney Wireless Museum in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Orkney Wireless Museum is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1983 establishments in Scotland, Charities based in Scotland, Communications in Scotland, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Orkney Wireless Museum outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Orkney Wireless Museum in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Orkney Wireless Museum means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Orkney Wireless Museum out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Orkney Wireless Museum in simple terms?

Why does Orkney Wireless Museum matter?

Because it connects several science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Orkney Wireless Museum?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Orkney Wireless Museum.