Visit the Marconi-RCA Wireless Museum

Welcome to Chatham on Cape Cod, where in 1914 radio pioneer Guglielmo Marconi’s company built a wireless receiving station paired with a companion transmitting station in Marion, Massachusetts.  Chatham Radio was later hailed as "The World's Greatest Coastal Station".  The campus of 10 original buildings on 11.3 acres has been preserved by the Town of Chatham as the Marconi-RCA National Register Historic District.  

Following World War One and with the intervention of the US government, Marconi’s American assets were acquired by the newly formed Radio Corporation of America.  By 1922 - a century ago - RCA’s Chatham station with call sign WCC was in full operation for maritime ship-to-shore service.  It would soon become the largest US coastal station in the marine service.  

Through informative panels, videos and interactive exhibits, visitors to the museum’s Wireless History gallery explore radio pioneer Guglielmo Marconi’s life and legacy, the role of maritime radio in world events, ship-to-shore communication with the actual shipboard radio from the hospital ship SS Hope, and artifacts from Chatham Radio WCC’s history.  Visitors experience firsthand how a radio operator touching a Morse code key in Chatham could be heard by his counterparts aboard ships sailing the seven seas, and learn about the talented and skilled people who conceived, built and operated the station.  In addition to relaying commercial and personal messages to ships, WCC communicated with pioneer aviators including Charles Lindbergh, Amelia Earhart and Howard Hughes.  

From 1942 through 1945, Chatham Radio played a key role in defeating Germany during the World War II Battle of the Atlantic by intercepting Enigma-encrypted wireless messages between the Third Reich’s headquarters and its ships at sea.  “Station C” (its wartime US Navy designation) forwarded these intercepts to Washington, D.C. for decoding.  As the control station for the East Coast direction-finding network, Station C also directed the search for telltale radio signals that allowed enemy vessels to be located and tracked.  The museum’s Navy Years exhibit features working electronic Enigma cipher machine simulators allowing visitors to try their hand at message encryption.

The museum’s other gallery is truly “open space” and open year-round.  This is the Antenna Field Trail, a winding path through the flora and fauna of Cape Cod with interpretive signs describing the station’s antennas, and offering views of the preserved 1914 station campus.  Some of the antennas are scaled replicas of the originals, actively used by amateur radio operators to communicate around the world.

The museum and its Museum Shop will also be open weekends in May and then Wednesdays through Sundays during the Summer.  Interpretive lectures and presentations provide context for the museum’s exhibits, and the Center offers engaging science, technology, engineering & mathematics (STEM) classes for youth year-round.  For information on museum hours, programs and events, Summer Science classes for kids, and ticketing please visit ChathamMarconi.org or call 508-945-8889.