Jig Jig Roger Peter

The U.S. Army Signal Corps brought one of the U.S. fighting fronts straight into millions of comfortable American living rooms this week. From beleaguered Anzio, Station JJRP (Jig Jig Roger Peter in Army lingo), "the toughest little radio station in the world," was relayed by RCAC to the U.S., where the four major networks rebroadcast its program. It was the first time a broadcasting station had been erected and put into continuous operation so close to the front lines.

Seven miles away, the U.S. Fifth Army was hard at work. Home-front listeners could not hear the gunfire but, with the special imagination that listeners bring to radio, they thought they could feel the roof of Station JJRP tremble under the impact of exploding shells, as the warcasters described.

Radio correspondents set the scene: it was a beautiful day, clear and sunny. From the broadcasting studio (sitting room of a battered ten-room villa) herds of sheep and flocks of chickens were visible. So were American soldiers, sunbathing, boating on the Mediterranean ("They look funny with their tin hats"), playing volleyball and softball in the "rest area." A hospital nearby was filled with "last night's casualties." The men of JJRP had just lost a pet horse named James to an anti-personnel bomb, not far from where a direct shell hit had "disintegrated" a Negro truck driver into "a thousand anonymous particles." It was "like living on a bull's-eye."

Lieut. James Holmlund and his six radiomen had labored three months to get JJRP going. They built their transmitter out of spare parts brought in from all over the world. This week's practically perfect results were worth the effort.

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