"I consider radio to be the most modern and the most crucial instrument for influencing the masses.." was a famous and important quote from Goebbels.
VolksempfängerThe Volksempfänger (German for "people's receiver") was a range of radio receivers developed by Otto Griessing at the request of Joseph Goebbels.
The purpose of the Volksempfänger-program was to make radio reception technology affordable to the general public. Joseph Goebbels realized the great propaganda potential of this relatively new medium and thus considered widespread availability of receivers highly important.
Volksempfaenger & 1936 Nazi propaganda poster, promoting
the use of the VolksempfängerMore:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volksempf%C3%A4nger More on the use of the radio by Goebbels' "
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ministry_of_Public_Enlightenment_and_Propaganda#Propaganda">Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda"....
RadioThe radio was an important tool in Nazi propaganda and it has been argued that it was the Nazis who pioneered the use of what was still a relatively new technology as a tool of genocide. Certainly the Nazis recognised the importance of radio in disseminating their message and to that end Goebbels approved a scheme whereby the production and distribution of millions of cheap radio sets was subsidised by the government. By the start of the Second World War over 70% of German households had one of these radios, which were deliberately limited in range in order to prevent them picking up foreign broadcasts. These so-called Volksempfänger featured little beyond propaganda and speeches. Radio broadcasts were also played over loudspeakers in public places and workplaces, where listeners were frequently observed by radio wardens.
As well as domestic broadcasts, the Nazi regime also used radio to deliver its message to both occupied territories and enemy states. One of the main targets was the United Kingdom to where William Joyce broadcast regularly, gaining the nickname 'Lord Haw-Haw' in the process. Joyce first appeared on German radio on 6 September 1939 reading the news in English but soon became noted for his often mischievous propaganda broadcasts. Joyce was executed in 1946 for treason. Although the most notorious, and most regularly heard, of the UK propagandists, Joyce was not the only broadcaster, with others such as Norman Baillie-Stewart, Jersey-born teacher Pearl Vardon, British Union of Fascists members Leonard Banning and Susan Hilton, Barry Payne Jones of the Link and Alexander Fraser Grant, whose show was aimed specifically at Scotland, also broadcasting through the 'New British Broadcasting Service'.
Broadcasts were also made to the United States, notably through Robert Henry Best and 'Axis Sally' Mildred Gillars. Best, a freelance journalist based in Vienna, was initially arrested following the German declaration of war on the US but before long he became a feature on propaganda radio, attacking the influence of the Jews in the US and the leadership of Franklin Delano Roosevelt. He would later be sentenced to life imprisonment for treason. Gilders, a teacher in Germany, mostly broadcast on similar themes as well as peppering her speech with allegations of infidelity against the wives of servicemen. Her most notorious broadcast was the 'Vision of Invasion' radio play, broadcast immediately prior to D-Day, from the perspective of an American mother who dreamed that her soldier son died violently in Normandy.
France also received broadcasts from Radio-Stuttgart, where Paul Ferdonnet, an anti-Semitic journalist, was the main voice during the Phoney War. Following the occupation Radio Paris and Radio Vichy became the main organs of propaganda, with leading far right figures such as Jacques Doriot, Philippe Henriot and Jean Hérold-Paquis regularly speaking in support of the Nazis. Others who broadcast included Gerald Hewitt, a British citizen who lived most of his life in Paris and had been associated with Action Française. The use of domestic broadcasters intended to galvanise support for occupation was also used in Belgium, where Ward Hermans regularly spoke in support of the Nazis from his base in Bremen, and the Italian Social Republic, to where Giovanni Preziosi broadcast a vehemently anti-Semitic show from his base in Munich. Pro-Nazi broadcasts were even heard in North Africa, where Mohammad Amin al-Husayni helped to insure the spread of Nazi ideas in the Arabic language.
Links to references here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazi_propaganda#Radio