A UNIQUE FREE NEWS AND INFORMATION SERVICE TO BLIND AND PARTIALLY SIGHTED PEOPLE
More pages coming soon
A free service established in 1976
CONTACT US
Charity No. 504996
West Shropshire Talking Newspaper
Fletcher Centre
Cross Hill
Shrewsbury SY1 1JE
01743 364 726 (answerphone)
WSTN listeners receive a USB memory stick every Friday containing a 80-minute programme of local news and information.
Our memory sticks play on computers and on portable USB players.
A small team of WSTN volunteers meet in our studio each week and use the high quality digital recording desk to make a new issue of the talking newspaper. Another team copies the recording onto an individual memory stick for posting to each listener.
The WSTN is also uploaded to the internet radio service run by British Wireless for the Blind Fund (BWBF). Listeners use BWBF Sonata Plus internet radio via home broadband. Click ‘Read More’ to hear a WSTN. Click ‘Video’ to find out about BWBF audio players.
LISTEN TO THE NEWS
RECORD THE NEWS
LISTEN ONLINE
Internet radio
Digital studio
Memory stick recording
- WSTN is a registered charity
- WSTN sells charity Christmas Cards in St Mary’s Church, Shrewsbury in November.
- WSTN makes collections at supermarkets
- WSTN receives support from donations
- WSTN is staffed by volunteers
- WSTN is published every week
40th ANNIVERSARY
The West Shropshire Talking Newspaper marked 40 years of talking newspaper service in Shropshire with special events in May and June 2016.
Click button below to read more online.
LISTEN ON MEMORY STICK, ONLINE AND ON YOUR TELEPHONE, 01743 387 487
Read more
Clicking the above application form button will open a two-page form to download and print. Please complete and obtain a signature from your doctor or opthalmologist and post to us.
the WSTN.
Read more
Read more
Click to Listen
Brief History
During 1975 a steering group was formed including a County Councillor, Philip Donnellan of Bridgnorth and a blind resident of nearby Hilton, Tony Banyard. A public meeting, held in Shrewsbury Castle and attended by representatives from across the county, resolved to set up a local talking newspaper. The service needed £5,500 to buy equipment and this sum was raised during the following few months allowing a first issue to be launched in May 1976.
The 90-minute programme of news and information was recorded on compact cassette and posted to the 252 blind and partially sighted people who formed our initial audience. Listeners’ reactions to the new publication were very enthusiastic and the volunteers were encouraged to further develop the free service. The Shropshire Talking Newspaper for the Blind charity divided itself into West and East organisations in 1990 to improve local coverage. Watch a video by the talking newspaper’s first presenter Alan Wilding.
Our easy-to-use zipped postal pouches carry the WSTN memory sticks out to listeners and back to our studio.