Arabic version: إيه بي سي كابريكورنيا تحتفل بمرور 95 عاماً في وسط كوينزلاند
According to ABC News, ABC Capricornia is celebrating 95 years of serving central Queensland, from local sport and community stories to emergency broadcasts during floods, cyclones and bushfires. The Rockhampton outlet began as privately run station 4RK at Gracemere in 1931, before the ABC took it on as its first regional Queensland radio station.
The station predates the national broadcaster, whose Australian Broadcasting Commission was launched the following year. ABC Capricornia moved in 1963 to its current Quay Street building, formerly the Mount Morgan Gold Mining Company’s head office and gold vaults.
The anniversary has prompted reflections on contributors including the late rugby union correspondent Terry Moore. He was a regular on the station’s Sports Show from the early 1980s, when rugby union, rugby league, Australian rules football and soccer correspondents discussed local sport. The program became ABC Grandstand Sport in 1990. Moore’s son Tom said his father had close to 35 years of involvement with the ABC, beginning with its classical music Concert Series in the late 1960s.
Six months before Moore died in October 2001, then-ABC board chair Donald McDonald gave him a special-recognition letter and meritorious service medallion. McDonald wrote that Moore’s rugby union reports had helped give the regional service credibility and authority, while recognising voluntary contributors who served central Queensland audiences.
ABC managing director Hugh Marks described local offices as the backbone of the ABC and said their personal connection with communities was fundamental. Rockhampton Regional Council Mayor Tony Williams called the ABC the backbone of regional Queensland, while Member for Rockhampton Donna Kirkland said the anniversary reflected the work of journalists, presenters, producers and staff, past and present.
