In 1927 preparations for a convention in Glasgow, Scotland, were undertaken. The dates arranged for were September 10 to 14. In preparation therefor the Society arranged to approach wireless license holders for signatures to a petition to broadcast the public lecture “Highway to Life.” This was to be presented in St. Andrews Grand Hall. Twenty-six thousand license holders signed the petition, representing about 100,000 people. Three brothers presented the petition to the British Broadcasting Corporation, which, however, turned it down, and not very graciously at that. Nonetheless, some ten thousand heard the address, about half that number in three halls connected by direct wire and a similar number in the streets who heard through loudspeakers.

At this time too the witnesses of Jehovah in this land were not to be balked by the dog-in-the-manger tactics of the British Broadcasting Corporation. Arrangements were made by Brother Rutherford in Britain for the regular broadcast of the Kingdom message from Continental stations. The Society supplied leaflets advertising the lectures and encouraging people in Britain to tune in. Fecamp, Radio Normandy and Lyons were among the stations advertised to let people hear Jehovah’s name and purpose.

Still more effective means were called into action for the purpose of spreading Jehovah’s name. “Impossible,” said cable engineers when the Society asked them to carry by direct wire a one-hour speech to auditoriums in five continents. On June 2, 1935, the speech “Government” was to be the high point of the five-day convention at Washington, D.C. Post-office engineers were to tie in six cities in Britain. As the hands moved up to eight o’clock, staccato, disjointed words and sounds came from the loudspeakers mounted in front of stage curtains as technicians, separated by ocean and continent, established lines, cemented circuits, checked connections. With ten seconds to go came the measured countdown “. . . two . . . one . . . ZERO.” After the chairman’s introduction came the familiar voice of Brother Rutherford and his talk focusing attention on the government of Jehovah God. The speech “Government” was on the air to run its electrifying sixty minutes, punctuated with applause, carrying its two-hemisphere audience to its climactic resolution, deafeningly supported. Interrupting the applause came the chairman’s voice. Interrupting the chairman’s voice came a cutoff in the circuit after an hour’s perfect reception. The “impossible” had been fully accomplished.