In 1922, the Deutsche Stunde, Gesellschaft für drahtlose Belehrung und Unterhaltung mbH was formed to promote the new science of radiobroadcasting and reception. This institution began broadcasting on 29 October 1923 from Berlin. In 1933, German broadcasting was brought under Nazi state control and the station became Reichssender Berlin, part of the nationalGroßdeutscher Rundfunk, controlled by Joseph Goebbels. The station was closed by the Allies at the end of the Battle of Berlin that brought the End of World War II in Europe.
In June and July 1953, a strike by construction workers in the German Democratic Republic led to an uprising of the people of the communist state which was violently put down by Soviet forces and the Volkspolizei. The government of the GDR accused RIAS of fanning the flames of the uprising and reporting inaccurately. This led to calls for West Berlin to have its own independent broadcaster as in the other Länder. A law was passed to establish this new broadcaster, which came into force on 12 November 1953, separating West Berlin from NWDR. The new Sender Freies Berlin began broadcasting two services, SFB1 and SFB2 on 1 June 1954, and joined the ARD in September 1954. SFB began broadcasting the ARD's television service in 1958 SFB's radio and television signals as well as covering West Berlin were receivable in many parts of East Germany; similarly, East German radio and television were receivable throughout West Berlin.
Third Programmes
On 1 October 1962 SFB and Norddeutscher Rundfunk began broadcasting the high-culture and classical music Drittes Programm, modeled on the British BBC Third Programme. This was joined by a service for immigrant workers on 1 June 1973, and became a separate service known as SFB3 on 1 April 1979. On 4 January 1965, a third public television service was started, joining ARD and ZDF. SFB and Radio Bremen both relayed the service provided by NDR – Nord 3. The best known programme on Nord 3 was "KONTRASTE", a political magazine that concentrated on developments in the Eastern bloc. N3's teletext service, Nordtext, carried information for West Berlin.
1989–2003
With the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, and the subsequent German reunification in 1990, Berlin was left with duplicate broadcasting outlets from the two administrations – SFB from the west and Berliner Rundfunk and Fernsehen der DDR from the east. On 1 January 1992, SFB became the public broadcasting company for the whole of reunited Berlin. However, SFB had long had a significant audience in East Berlin for some time before reunification. The radio station SFB1 became Berlin 88,8. In October 1992, the N3 television service was replaced by the SFB service B1, later SFB1. The GDR's national television service was closed and replaced by four ARD regions: an expanded NDR in the north; the continuing SFB in Berlin; and the new Mitteldeutscher Rundfunk in the south and Ostdeutscher Rundfunk Brandenburg in the east. On 22 February 1993, the SFB began a joint venture with the new ORB to create Radio BZWEI, a news and information service for the east of the country aimed at 25 to 50-year-old listeners. On 1 March 1993, the two broadcasters launched Fritz, a radio station for young people. On 18 September 1994, SFB launched RADIOmultikulti, a service for foreign nationals and immigrants to Germany. This was joined by InfoRADIO, a SFB/ORB joint venture news station, on 28 August 1995. In 1995 the Ostdeutscher Rundfunk Brandenburg in coalition with the Sender Freies Berlin started their Internet radio streaming service Info-Radio on Demand. On 3 October 1997, SFB and ORB launched RADIOkultur, a cultural station taking up much of the programming of SFB3, with an emphasis on classic, world, jazz and new music and politics.
Merger
Having co-operated on many of services, SFB and ORB merged on 1 May 2003 to form Rundfunk Berlin-Brandenburg.
