Concerning advice on tools, if you please. km6x7.

[tonequester]

tonequester here.

Happy to make your "aquaintance" km6x7. I really appreciate your post concerning ideas on soldring irons, meters, scopes, and the like. You gave many
good ideas. I plan to check around my vacinity about the Ham equipment. I once knew a Tech at Deluxe Check where I used to work. He was a damned good one. I
was just getting into some basic electronics for use in repairing and modifying my guitars and amps, stereos and the like. I talked to him frequently, and he was always ready with good advice and many unconcentional ways to trouble shoot, usually with only a good meter. He was old school, and had gotten his education the Ham radio
way. He thought it a great program, but he warned me...."there's one bugaboo......the Code !". Much later I checked out one of those ARRL Handbooks( I think that's the
title ) and I quickly realized why he so knowledgeable. Hey ! Thanks again for helping a "newbie" like me. It's greatly appreciated. tonequester.

[km6xz]

You are welcome! Note that code is no longer required yet many people prefer it since it is so efficient and very simple home made equipment work well. Now digital modes are pretty popular now also.
Good luck!

[Steve Conner]

-.-- .- -.-- ..-. . .-. -.-. --- -.. .

I got my license before the code requirement was done away with, but I'm glad they did away with it. Ham radio needs all the help it can get.

[Enzo]

I learned my electronics doing short wave. As much as I was interested in radio, having to learn a code I never intended to use was the whole reason I never got my ham ticket. Much resistance to dropping the code I fear was the existing ham community not wanting to let someone in without going through that. Sort of a hazing thing, sorta.

I did know the code though. My freshman year at college, living in a dorm on a very large campus, one night I started using the venetian blinds to signal out CQ CQ CQ. Really surprised me when a few moments later one of the windows in the girls' dorm across the street started signaling back. We exchanged a few brief messsages, then exchanged phone numbers, and that was the end of our morse code. Oh, and nothing ever came of it, I never even met the girls there.

So for one shining moment I "worked" Akers Hall Dormitory on line of sight.


Don't recall but a few letters of the code these days.

[tonequester]

tonequester here.

Great story Enzo. If you had joined the Navy, they might have had you signaling ship-to-ship. With my memory, I tip my hat to anyone who ever learned the "dreaded code". Also, with the advice you've shared since I've been using this forum, it doesn't surprise me that you went that route in your training. The Handbooks(ARRL I think) are pretty
awsome. tonequester.

[Enzo]

The ARRL handbook was worth every penny. It comes out fresh every year - or at least used to - and I bought a new copy every couple years to keep up to date.

[tonequester]

The ARRL handbook was worth every penny. It comes out fresh every year - or at least used to - and I bought a new copy every couple years to keep up to date.

tonequester here.

Enzo. I believe that I'll check to see if my local library still has the handbook. It seems that years ago there was an order form in each one. If so, I may just order one. If I remember correctly, they always had plenty of basics, in addition to the whole transmit/receive thing. Steve Conner made the comment that he didn't think that they were so intent on one's learning Morse code anymore. It might make a good textbook for me. If you feel it was that "handy", it's good enough for me.
Thanks for the "review". tonequester.

[km6xz]

Find an old copy at a used book store, they were had good sections on tubes and building with tubes. Or check with the local ham club, they will probably give a copy away if someone shows an interest in what was once considered the most exciting hobby for children and adults in the 30s,40s and 50s.
After Sputnik was launched, the US was in shock, and unlike today, could at the time band together and change things. The 50s was a radical time of great change in the society with a sense of common purpose. For example the middle class was created, the highway system was built even before a lot of people figured out what to do with it, and the GI Bill of Rights transformed the country to a middle class dominated society. One of the sudden measures to get back the national pride lost to the Soviets was to make science and engineering a priority. Every high school in the country got a ham radio station with federal funds, mostly Hammerlund receivers and Johnson transmitters and Hygain antennas.
Science and math became a passion for millions of kids who were motivated by curiosity, instead of now, only by money, to discover something. Science fairs and competition because subjects for national media coverage. That sudden emphasis on science was the direct progenitor of the moon landing and Silicon Valley and all the innovation that helped the economy zoom past the rest of the world. Other countries are doing similar things that the US did back then to create a strong middle class so expect good things from them.

As a country we have been coasting on the growth of the 50s and 60s and no real income increases or market share of ideas since the 1970s. There is a direct link between kids being motivated by curiosity and action and the future well-being of a country. Ham radio was one of the important tools in that. I remember science clubs and radio clubs grew so large as after school activities that sometimes meetings needed to me moved to the basketball court to accommodate them.

Code was not hard but I did not learn it effectively for a long time, it delayed my getting a ham license until I was 10 years old. I did not know anybody who was a ham so did not have a way of taking the test anyway until I wandered far out of my neighborhood in the suburbs of Sacramento and spotted a old wooden wagon wheel on a porch as a decorative display of the address and 2 sets of call letters on it.W6EPG and K6TYJ. It took several trips back to get up my nerve to know on their door.
An old woman came to the door(I thought she was really old but probably in her 50s, I was 8). I asked if she was a ham and she opened the screen door while yelling to unseen people in the background "Johnny, here's another one" while motioning me inside and led me to an extention built onto the house that was radio club house adjoining a garage converted to workshop, lab. The radio room was full of people from 12 to 60 years old. Some were tuning on the radios, other's building things in the shop. Jonh E. Tayor was a electrician for the Southern Pacific RR and a ham since the 20s. He mentored dozens of young people and adults who in turned found others to mentor and I found out that this clubhouse was a Mecca for kids like me.
I was asked in a gruff cigar smoke puff covering his lips "what do you want and what is your name?" I said I wanted to be a ham. I had already read every book in the library on electricity and electronics but never had a chance to talk with people who knew about it or even how to pronounce the names of the parts I was building radios and amplifiers with. He replied, "go in there" and pointed to the workshop. Another adult was in there working on a tube short wave receiver and just picked up where Johnny left off, "what do you want, here, fix this" and handed me a meter with a broken knob. Soon I was teaching electronics to new arrivals, often 4 times my age, now that I knew even how to pronounce the names of parts and theory.
I was in heaven, a real oscilloscope, a bunch of old test gear, a drill press, metal shear, and brake, piles of sheet steel and aluminium, and hundreds of wooden cigar boxes full of parts that were all carefully labeled, everything to make electronic projects.

I had tried learning the code alone but Johnny's second hobby was old organs and had a large 3 rank Wurlitzer in the living room. He used the organ for weekend recitals by a house mate he adopted, another old ham who had fallen on hard times. Also named John, the guy was a whiz on the organ and played professionally in theaters and ball parks since the twenties. He got a gig playing at a large hotel ballroom through Jonnny's efforts so was feeling pretty good about his future. He was assigned to test my code on the organ and found I had some weak spots but basically knew the letters.
Over a month or two of after school training to listen to code as a musical sound instead of dits and dahs to be counted, I was ready to take my test. I passed the code portion and the technical part of the exam was a breeze. I was 9 by the time I took the exam and anxious to get on the air. I was building yet another transmitter so I was ready.
It seemed like forever to get my license in the mail, in fact it never came, I waited everyday by the mail box waiting for the mailman. Each day he apologized for disappointing me again. finally, as summer was approaching and the annual vacation to our beach house would take me away for 6 weeks, after which I would be put on a train and sent up to the mountains where all my relatives lived, and spend another 6 weeks exploring the mountains, hiking fishing and just being wild in nature alone. That was the traditional summer vacation and I was very upset that my license was not here yet. One day the mailman gave me a phone number to call, it was our local congressman's office. I had my dad call, and he told them of my plight, by summer's end it would be a year in waiting.
My dad handed me a slip of paper about a week later and said it was mine. It was a call letter set, he said the congressman contacted the FCC and the license application had been misplaced so the congressman requested a full report and resolution of the situation in a week. That got them on it apparently because I got my actual license in the mail a few days later, a week before the departure for the ocean. By the time it arrived I had just turned 10 two days before. I raced to my bedroom lab and fired up my receiver and newest home made transmitter and coded out CQ, a call for conversation. Within a few minutes another kid, 12, answered from Montana. I stayed on the air all night and the next day until I feel asleep at the operating desk with the code key under my right hand. My second foreign ham to talk with by code was a student at the radio institute in Moscow which started my interest in learning about some of the exotic places I was hearing and talking with. We exchange post cards, confirming the contracts, called QSL cards. Sometime it took months to arrive. I had a good location for Europe and South Pacific islands so talked many times to Russia, Scandinavia, UK, Germany towards the east and tiny islands few people ever heard of in the Pacific, where I talked to Senator Goldwater, King Hussein of Jordan, the King of Thailand, and more interesting people and places. That started my interest in travel and why I ended up in 86 countries and now live in Russia.
I remember that about 1/2 my HS graduating class went on to become engineers or scientists. It was a different era and I can't remember anyone who said their vocation choice was related to money. No MBA candidates or Wall Street types, just excited kids wanting to discover something or design something great. What a change in society since then, an unfortunate change, but one we did to ourselves.

[Enzo]

It should be easy to find an ARRL Radio Amateurs Handbook. In fact I will go look. Wait here...

Yep, ARRL sells them themselves: ARRL :: What's New

But that is just the 2012 edition, which would be fine, but it includes very little about tubes anymore

If you found an old one from 1957 or 1962 or whatever, there would be mostly tubes. The basics are in there too, and current and voltage and resistance are timeless.

Amazon.com lists it. And like most books there, they also give access to places selling them used. I see used ones there for $20. But that was a 2011 version.

If you want to learn from it appropriately for tube amps, I recommend an older issue of it, and like Stan says, check with the loocal ham clubs or visit a ham fest. Might find an old one cheap or free.

ARRL activity is a lot stronger in the ham community than anything is in guitar amp land. so they have the ARRL as a central organization, we have nothing comparable. Here is a link to a find-it page for ham fests and conventions:
Hamfests and Conventions Calendar

[km6xz]

Wow, talk about times changing.....the new Handbook is $59 and my first one, which I saved lawn cutting and lemonade stand money for weeks to get my first handbook in 1959 for the princely sum of $3.50. I was so proud of it, I took it to school Show and Tell where all the guys thought I was suddenly so cool!

[Enzo]

The modern one is in a large format. Seems to me up to somewhere around the end of the 1950s they had been using a small format. About the size of a paperback book, but a lot thicker. Then they went to the mid-size format for a while.

[madkatb]

@tonequester
If you're serious about wanting an old ARRL Handbook I have a 1957 copy in fairly decent shape. Yours for a small donation to the Forum (apparently they sell for $15 so say $5-10?). PM your address.

[tonequester]

@tonequester
If you're serious about wanting an old ARRL Handbook I have a 1957 copy in fairly decent shape. Yours for a small donation to the Forum (apparently they sell for $15 so say $5-10?). PM your address.

tonequester here.

Hello,madkatb. Thank you for your offer on the '57 ARRL Handbook. How about I donate $7.50 to the forum ? That splits the difference on your price quote.
I see the green colored Donate selection on the task bar above, and asume that's where I've got to go to accomplish this. I'll check it out after I finish the replies I'm working on
now. I have to warn you about one thing. I don't use plastic on the internet. I'll be happy to send them a postal money order if they'll take it. Thanks for the offer. You can wait for proof that I paid up, but you'll have to figure that one out yourself. Whenever you're satisfied that I've sent in the $7.50, you can send the book to : Larry Boydston, 20220
West 199th.st. Spring hill, KS. 66083. Hell ! There is bound to be shipping charges. Tell you what. Find out how much it costs to ship at reasonable cost and let me know.
we'll figure it out then. I'm the one who would like the book, and a new one(which I don't really need) I'm sure runs near $100.00. If you get me the shipping price and an address, I'll send it to you, and I'll make the $7.50 donation before you have to turn loose the book. Let me know if you feel this is a fair proposal. tonequester out.

[tonequester]

It should be easy to find an ARRL Radio Amateurs Handbook. In fact I will go look. Wait here...

Yep, ARRL sells them themselves: ARRL :: What's New

But that is just the 2012 edition, which would be fine, but it includes very little about tubes anymore

If you found an old one from 1957 or 1962 or whatever, there would be mostly tubes. The basics are in there too, and current and voltage and resistance are timeless.

Amazon.com lists it. And like most books there, they also give access to places selling them used. I see used ones there for $20. But that was a 2011 version.

If you want to learn from it appropriately for tube amps, I recommend an older issue of it, and like Stan says, check with the loocal ham clubs or visit a ham fest. Might find an old one cheap or free.

ARRL activity is a lot stronger in the ham community than anything is in guitar amp land. so they have the ARRL as a central organization, we have nothing comparable. Here is a link to a find-it page for ham fests and conventions:
Hamfests and Conventions Calendar

tonequester here.

Thanks for the Hamfest info Enzo. It took some doing but I found out that there is a Hamfest, 11/10/12 at Raytown, Missouri near K.C. town. That's only a 40 minute drive for me, so barring the end of the world, I will be in attendance. Like you stated, they have their act together. I could tell how organized they are by stumbling around their web-site. Theu have a big conference in Dayton Ohio at the first of the year, to be followed by a national conference in California. As far as the handbook is concerned, I now have a line on getting a 1957 edition through this forum, for a small donation to the forum. I'ts well worth it based on the help I've received here from the very start. Thanks again, and have a great one ! tonequester.

[tonequester]

Find an old copy at a used book store, they were had good sections on tubes and building with tubes. Or check with the local ham club, they will probably give a copy away if someone shows an interest in what was once considered the most exciting hobby for children and adults in the 30s,40s and 50s.
After Sputnik was launched, the US was in shock, and unlike today, could at the time band together and change things. The 50s was a radical time of great change in the society with a sense of common purpose. For example the middle class was created, the highway system was built even before a lot of people figured out what to do with it, and the GI Bill of Rights transformed the country to a middle class dominated society. One of the sudden measures to get back the national pride lost to the Soviets was to make science and engineering a priority. Every high school in the country got a ham radio station with federal funds, mostly Hammerlund receivers and Johnson transmitters and Hygain antennas.
Science and math became a passion for millions of kids who were motivated by curiosity, instead of now, only by money, to discover something. Science fairs and competition because subjects for national media coverage. That sudden emphasis on science was the direct progenitor of the moon landing and Silicon Valley and all the innovation that helped the economy zoom past the rest of the world. Other countries are doing similar things that the US did back then to create a strong middle class so expect good things from them.

As a country we have been coasting on the growth of the 50s and 60s and no real income increases or market share of ideas since the 1970s. There is a direct link between kids being motivated by curiosity and action and the future well-being of a country. Ham radio was one of the important tools in that. I remember science clubs and radio clubs grew so large as after school activities that sometimes meetings needed to me moved to the basketball court to accommodate them.

Code was not hard but I did not learn it effectively for a long time, it delayed my getting a ham license until I was 10 years old. I did not know anybody who was a ham so did not have a way of taking the test anyway until I wandered far out of my neighborhood in the suburbs of Sacramento and spotted a old wooden wagon wheel on a porch as a decorative display of the address and 2 sets of call letters on it.W6EPG and K6TYJ. It took several trips back to get up my nerve to know on their door.
An old woman came to the door(I thought she was really old but probably in her 50s, I was 8). I asked if she was a ham and she opened the screen door while yelling to unseen people in the background "Johnny, here's another one" while motioning me inside and led me to an extention built onto the house that was radio club house adjoining a garage converted to workshop, lab. The radio room was full of people from 12 to 60 years old. Some were tuning on the radios, other's building things in the shop. Jonh E. Tayor was a electrician for the Southern Pacific RR and a ham since the 20s. He mentored dozens of young people and adults who in turned found others to mentor and I found out that this clubhouse was a Mecca for kids like me.
I was asked in a gruff cigar smoke puff covering his lips "what do you want and what is your name?" I said I wanted to be a ham. I had already read every book in the library on electricity and electronics but never had a chance to talk with people who knew about it or even how to pronounce the names of the parts I was building radios and amplifiers with. He replied, "go in there" and pointed to the workshop. Another adult was in there working on a tube short wave receiver and just picked up where Johnny left off, "what do you want, here, fix this" and handed me a meter with a broken knob. Soon I was teaching electronics to new arrivals, often 4 times my age, now that I knew even how to pronounce the names of parts and theory.
I was in heaven, a real oscilloscope, a bunch of old test gear, a drill press, metal shear, and brake, piles of sheet steel and aluminium, and hundreds of wooden cigar boxes full of parts that were all carefully labeled, everything to make electronic projects.

I had tried learning the code alone but Johnny's second hobby was old organs and had a large 3 rank Wurlitzer in the living room. He used the organ for weekend recitals by a house mate he adopted, another old ham who had fallen on hard times. Also named John, the guy was a whiz on the organ and played professionally in theaters and ball parks since the twenties. He got a gig playing at a large hotel ballroom through Jonnny's efforts so was feeling pretty good about his future. He was assigned to test my code on the organ and found I had some weak spots but basically knew the letters.
Over a month or two of after school training to listen to code as a musical sound instead of dits and dahs to be counted, I was ready to take my test. I passed the code portion and the technical part of the exam was a breeze. I was 9 by the time I took the exam and anxious to get on the air. I was building yet another transmitter so I was ready.
It seemed like forever to get my license in the mail, in fact it never came, I waited everyday by the mail box waiting for the mailman. Each day he apologized for disappointing me again. finally, as summer was approaching and the annual vacation to our beach house would take me away for 6 weeks, after which I would be put on a train and sent up to the mountains where all my relatives lived, and spend another 6 weeks exploring the mountains, hiking fishing and just being wild in nature alone. That was the traditional summer vacation and I was very upset that my license was not here yet. One day the mailman gave me a phone number to call, it was our local congressman's office. I had my dad call, and he told them of my plight, by summer's end it would be a year in waiting.
My dad handed me a slip of paper about a week later and said it was mine. It was a call letter set, he said the congressman contacted the FCC and the license application had been misplaced so the congressman requested a full report and resolution of the situation in a week. That got them on it apparently because I got my actual license in the mail a few days later, a week before the departure for the ocean. By the time it arrived I had just turned 10 two days before. I raced to my bedroom lab and fired up my receiver and newest home made transmitter and coded out CQ, a call for conversation. Within a few minutes another kid, 12, answered from Montana. I stayed on the air all night and the next day until I feel asleep at the operating desk with the code key under my right hand. My second foreign ham to talk with by code was a student at the radio institute in Moscow which started my interest in learning about some of the exotic places I was hearing and talking with. We exchange post cards, confirming the contracts, called QSL cards. Sometime it took months to arrive. I had a good location for Europe and South Pacific islands so talked many times to Russia, Scandinavia, UK, Germany towards the east and tiny islands few people ever heard of in the Pacific, where I talked to Senator Goldwater, King Hussein of Jordan, the King of Thailand, and more interesting people and places. That started my interest in travel and why I ended up in 86 countries and now live in Russia.
I remember that about 1/2 my HS graduating class went on to become engineers or scientists. It was a different era and I can't remember anyone who said their vocation choice was related to money. No MBA candidates or Wall Street types, just excited kids wanting to discover something or design something great. What a change in society since then, an unfortunate change, but one we did to ourselves.

tonequester here.

Greetings km6xz. I thank you for the most informative post. I too can remember when many of the houses in town and out in 'the country' had the shortwave
antennae mounted to the roof or the side of the house. I had a neighbor who's antenna seemed to be growing like the surrounding trees. It got taller every year, and it's "branches" seemed to grow as well. I was not lucky in that I never had a member of my family or a close friend who could have introduced me to Ham. From your post, I missed out on quite an experience. There was not only the learning experience(electronics & communications ), but it sounds like there was a great deal of comradeship as well.
Enzo and I conversed a little about this recently. He pointed out the strong organization and affiliation that the ARRL still maintains today, although ham is not so nearly popular
as it once was. It's a shame, because mindless hand held video games, cell phones that play games, and the various game systems out there for computer and home theater,
today's child is missing out on a lot of good experiences while they mindlessly wear their thumb joints out, over-stimulate certain parts of their brains, and ocassionally walk out
in front of an oncoming car, oblivious. If I would have had the opportunity to get involved as you did, am sure that I would have. I would now be a lot farther down the road
toward the educational goals I have set for myself, and would possibly be a more socially rounded persion as well. When you said it was a different ERA back then, I'm tempted to claim understatement. I miss those days, and I guess that this applies to each succeeding generation. Now, I know why my dad used to just shake his head when he would
see a youngster with shoulder length hair, walking down the road barefoot, thumbing a ride. I find myself shaking my head more end more. Thanks again for giving me an idea on what the Ham experience was like, and for the advice that you have given me. I have already found a Hamfest in my area to check out, and on this very forum I have the opportunity to get my hands on a 1957 ARRL Handbook, for a small donation to the forum. I can't think of a better donation to make when I think of the time folks like you, Enzo, Steve Conner, Austin, Chuck H, big---teee, loudthud, and all the rest have spent trying to help me out. I hope things are very well for you and yours in St. Petersburg.

Quote : "Freedom is not enough". Lyndon Baines Johnson.

[tonequester]

@tonequester
If you're serious about wanting an old ARRL Handbook I have a 1957 copy in fairly decent shape. Yours for a small donation to the Forum (apparently they sell for $15 so say $5-10?). PM your address.

tonequester here.


madkatb. Today, I got a wonderful surprise in the mail. The 34th edition of the Radio Amateur's Handbook arrived in perfect shape. The year of publication is special for me. I was born in 1957. I will TREASURE this book, and never forget the generosity of a Canadian gentleman who will always be known to me as madkatb.
Generosity is a grace from God, that is all to rare these days. I do find it frequently on this forum, in the time spent sharing advice with each other. If there is a "rotten apple"
in this "barrel", I haven't found it yet , I will donate $10.00 to the forum, in your name, by Postal
Money Order this week, but I will reimburse you for the shipping with a money order sent to the return address on the padded envelope that the book came in. I can tell
you that I would not take $100.00 for the book. My S.S.D.I. will be deposited in a few days and I will make my monthly trip to the bank. I'll pick up the two money orders at
that time. I'll waste no time sending you the shipping, and making the forum donation in your name. Once again, I can't conceive of a way to truly express my happiness
at your generous gesture. The book is precious to me. Your gesture is PRICELESS ! Many Thanks My FRIEND ! If I can be of help to you,... type tonequester.


Quote : "The grass may look greener on the other side, but believe me, it's just as hard to cut." Little Richard.

[madkatb]

No problem tonequester. I was born in 58 so it's a little bit too "old school" for me.

[tonequester]

tonequester here.


Glad you got my post madkatb. With this super freaking sensitive Toshiba laptop I got about a month ago, I am never sure until I get a reply. You've got some nerve.
"Old School". We're both 6 foot over, not under. I had about an hour with the book this evening and it's great. It blows me away how popular Ham used to be, and that was a principle method of learning to be a tech, in "the day". I was facinated by the forward. I had no ideas that Hiram Maxim, of machine gun fame, founded the ARRL. Also, it had never occured to me that Ham operators were bound to such principles, nor that they had been so valuable to the U.S. interest in the "BIG" wars. The ad section at the end of the book brought back memories of
the kind of ads that were the stuff of dreams for kids of our generation. I never was a big Bob Hope fan but........"Thanks for the memories." tonequester.

[tonequester]

tonequester here.



km6xz. Thanks to madkatb I recieved the 1957 handbook in the daily mail. It's list price was $3.50 as well. I spent an hour just skimming it today. What a trip down memory lane it turned out to be for even me, who never had the Ham experience. The Amateurs Code alone took me back to the days when before class started at school everyday, we said the Pledge of Allegiance with hands over hearts, looking at the flag. I read the history part of Amateur Radio and learned that Hiram Maxim founded the ARRL, and how important important
amateur radio was in the "BIG" wars. Even the old ad section at the end of the book brought back a flood of memories. Most of all, I could easily see that if I can assimilate the majority of this 54 year old book, I may be giving advice on this forum one day instead of always asking for it. I would have taken it to show and tell too ! I hope all is well with you and yours in St.
Petersburg. OH ! By the way. I'm going to skip that "old Bugaboo".........the Code ! tonequester, cookin' in Kansas.

[km6xz]

The main reason ham ham radio got government approval when other commercial and government services wanted all the ham bands of frequencies was due to the civil defense and emergency communications that hams traditionally supplied.
In March of '64, Alaska had what was at the time, the largest earthquake ever recorded. A 9.2 magnitude in the early evening their time. I was doing what I was often doing, tuning around the frequencies hoping to hear a far off countries to talk with. I was 14 at the time. I noticed some weak signals with in transmissions between a ham in Canada and one I could hardly hear in Alaska. The Canadian ham was trying to understand so was repeating some incomplete phrases so the Alaskan ham could fill in the missing parts. Eventually I understood it to be about an earthquake, so I turned on the radio and found a mention and Tsunami warning for the north coast of California. There was almost no details. By late evening a little news started filtering down to the ConUS. I stayed glued to my equipment hoping to hear what details could be found but very few hams were on the air up there. The propagation had shifted so signals on 40 meters were getting a lot better at my location so was able to relay information from the strongest signal ham I heard. As it turned out, my location was hearing them the best and that start an all night message handling event. I kept switching bands as propagation shifted and kept relaying messages, many at first were from government offices and from the air force base near Anchorage but for the first 10 hours or so my signals were the main link between aid requests and services in the lower 48. After late morning the next day, government and air force communications systems came on the air so my activity shifted to health and welfare messages of a civilian nature. There were only a few hams in Alaska that knew what was going on and had functioning equipment so, although there were a thousands in the lower 48 who wanted to help, there were few to communicate with who had battery or mobile systems that could be heard down in the states or even over to Canada. I was pretty lucky to have a location and antenna system that favored that region. Ham radio was vital for initial emergency communications, all on short wave, mostly on International Morse code because that mode was better with weak signals that were coming from a couple mobile or battery powered stations.
It made the local news that a 14 year old kid was handling much of the first hours of emergency messages so eventually the mayor gave me a large plaque for being a "radio hero"....the only reason it was me who was doing it was the luck of radio propagation between the stricken area and my home location. But that was the typical use of ham radio by communities for local and national emergencies, the war(ham radio was suspended during WWI and WWII) by supplying a major portion of the trained radio operators for the first phases of the war. Millions of messages between military bases in Korea and later in Viet Nam between soldiers and their families were relayed via ham radio as about the only way to get messages to or from home.
Any time there was a missing child, flood, large forest fire, parade or whatever that needed communications, local communities called on hams to provide communications. So there was a real reason to exist other than just the hobby aspects, and for the innovation that occurred when hundreds of thousands of technically savvy people who got their start with ham radio expanded their activities to include invention and creating businesses around it. The computer industry, the US leadership in instrumentation, Silicon Valley and thousands of technology businesses or scientific careers began through ham radio.
It is too bad there is no equivalent now to challenge and motive kids. At least in the 1970s and 80s programming caught the attention of kids who were significant players in developing programs and companies but that died off so kids are consumers of ready made applications and games, not the designers of them. One hobby that is popular here but I doubt it is in the US, among kids and adults alike is microprocessor based programming for robotics and communications. Every electronics parts store has display cases full of development boards, modules and sub-assemblies that are used in programming embedded devices. It seems that all electronics before microprocessors has been skipped and the main hobby is programming at machine level.
There is a direct connection between the open ended avid involvement in technical and science based hobbies of the 1930-1960s is what made the US the leader in technology but that home grown innovation is now focused on other regions of the world, mainly Asia and Central Asia. Science has become a dirty word, in the US, with polarized political beliefs preventing the population from supporting it, encouraging it or understanding it so the kids learn by example and remain outside the sphere of the rational. Science, scientists, explorers, the quest for space exploration, were revered in the 1950s, more than rock stars or celebrities, and certainly more than billionaires, the country accepted that knowledge was a good thing. Most of our problems stem from believing the opposite.
I think the intentional glorification of ignorance is the main reason I will never live in the US again, the rest of the world is more rational and normal, with the ideals that would have been very much appreciated in the US 50 years ago except in some backwards religious enclaves that thinking people ignored. When I travel I see the "American Dream" alive and well in just about every country...except the US where few people believe in it and fewer act on it.

[tonequester]

The main reason ham ham radio got government approval when other commercial and government services wanted all the ham bands of frequencies was due to the civil defense and emergency communications that hams traditionally supplied.
In March of '64, Alaska had what was at the time, the largest earthquake ever recorded. A 9.2 magnitude in the early evening their time. I was doing what I was often doing, tuning around the frequencies hoping to hear a far off countries to talk with. I was 14 at the time. I noticed some weak signals with in transmissions between a ham in Canada and one I could hardly hear in Alaska. The Canadian ham was trying to understand so was repeating some incomplete phrases so the Alaskan ham could fill in the missing parts. Eventually I understood it to be about an earthquake, so I turned on the radio and found a mention and Tsunami warning for the north coast of California. There was almost no details. By late evening a little news started filtering down to the ConUS. I stayed glued to my equipment hoping to hear what details could be found but very few hams were on the air up there. The propagation had shifted so signals on 40 meters were getting a lot better at my location so was able to relay information from the strongest signal ham I heard. As it turned out, my location was hearing them the best and that start an all night message handling event. I kept switching bands as propagation shifted and kept relaying messages, many at first were from government offices and from the air force base near Anchorage but for the first 10 hours or so my signals were the main link between aid requests and services in the lower 48. After late morning the next day, government and air force communications systems came on the air so my activity shifted to health and welfare messages of a civilian nature. There were only a few hams in Alaska that knew what was going on and had functioning equipment so, although there were a thousands in the lower 48 who wanted to help, there were few to communicate with who had battery or mobile systems that could be heard down in the states or even over to Canada. I was pretty lucky to have a location and antenna system that favored that region. Ham radio was vital for initial emergency communications, all on short wave, mostly on International Morse code because that mode was better with weak signals that were coming from a couple mobile or battery powered stations.
It made the local news that a 14 year old kid was handling much of the first hours of emergency messages so eventually the mayor gave me a large plaque for being a "radio hero"....the only reason it was me who was doing it was the luck of radio propagation between the stricken area and my home location. But that was the typical use of ham radio by communities for local and national emergencies, the war(ham radio was suspended during WWI and WWII) by supplying a major portion of the trained radio operators for the first phases of the war. Millions of messages between military bases in Korea and later in Viet Nam between soldiers and their families were relayed via ham radio as about the only way to get messages to or from home.
Any time there was a missing child, flood, large forest fire, parade or whatever that needed communications, local communities called on hams to provide communications. So there was a real reason to exist other than just the hobby aspects, and for the innovation that occurred when hundreds of thousands of technically savvy people who got their start with ham radio expanded their activities to include invention and creating businesses around it. The computer industry, the US leadership in instrumentation, Silicon Valley and thousands of technology businesses or scientific careers began through ham radio.
It is too bad there is no equivalent now to challenge and motive kids. At least in the 1970s and 80s programming caught the attention of kids who were significant players in developing programs and companies but that died off so kids are consumers of ready made applications and games, not the designers of them. One hobby that is popular here but I doubt it is in the US, among kids and adults alike is microprocessor based programming for robotics and communications. Every electronics parts store has display cases full of development boards, modules and sub-assemblies that are used in programming embedded devices. It seems that all electronics before microprocessors has been skipped and the main hobby is programming at machine level.
There is a direct connection between the open ended avid involvement in technical and science based hobbies of the 1930-1960s is what made the US the leader in technology but that home grown innovation is now focused on other regions of the world, mainly Asia and Central Asia. Science has become a dirty word, in the US, with polarized political beliefs preventing the population from supporting it, encouraging it or understanding it so the kids learn by example and remain outside the sphere of the rational. Science, scientists, explorers, the quest for space exploration, were revered in the 1950s, more than rock stars or celebrities, and certainly more than billionaires, the country accepted that knowledge was a good thing. Most of our problems stem from believing the opposite.
I think the intentional glorification of ignorance is the main reason I will never live in the US again, the rest of the world is more rational and normal, with the ideals that would have been very much appreciated in the US 50 years ago except in some backwards religious enclaves that thinking people ignored. When I travel I see the "American Dream" alive and well in just about every country...except the US where few people believe in it and fewer act on it.

tonequester here.


Greeting's km6xz ! As always, your post gives me pause to think, and to wonder. In my 54 years there has been so much change in the world that it all
seems like a dream that we haven't yet arisen from. I really have no problem with change. I remember when our t.v. would go on the "fritz" and my dad would pull all of the tubes out(carefully labeling them) and we'd take them to the grocery store and use a tube tester the size of a juke box to find out which one was bad. Then we'd buy the replacement right there. I remember thinking how great it was when S.S. came out, and so quickly increased the variety of products, decreased their size, and soon enough even brought costs down. However, those were also the days of great upheaval over the Vietnam war and the civil rights movement. At least in that day, the U.S. seemed to "get it right" half of the time. Both events were tragic for so many, but at least one brought about positive changes, not that all was/is perfect. At least being from Kansas
I never had to see a "whites only" sign, except on the news. Now America is owned "lock, stock, and barrel" by 2 or 3% of the population, truth be known, and these few
do not have a true American agenda. Whoever first said that "money is the root of all evil" must have had a vision of the future, and in the vision watched the evening news.
The saddest thing, and the thing that will destroy the "American Dream's last remnents" is the sheer ignorance of the voting population, combined with apathy about what is
happening to the country. My grandfather was a welder for General Motors from the mid-30's until he retired. He was involved in the first "sit down strike" at Kansas City's
Leeds plant. He built B-17's and M-10 tank destroyers during WWII when car production halted. he was of course a die hard union man. He was also the only Liberal in our small town. He told me that in my day, we'd have to fight for "it all again". From an early age he impressed on me his belief in the "American Dream", but he told me that
anyone who thought that our rights couldn';t be taken away was an imbicile. He believed that no war would defeat us, but he greatly feared the rich. You are right in pointing out the differences in what influences the younger generation these days. I have a nephew who by his own admission plays video games until 1:00am during the week. He has no end of problems with schoolwork and it seems that he has A.D.H.D. I know that rebellion is natural to an extent when one is young. I grew my hair long and
went to rock concerts my last year in high school. I also made National Honor Society with straight A's all the way. We didn't dare touch the t.v. until all homework was done, and if I had ever brought home even a C........I shudder to think ! Some people over here would have a problem with a successful person leaving this country for St. Petersburg. I wonder that more
haven't. I know that you must be a man of conviction and principals. It's getting very hard to be that kind of man in this country. You have led one of the most interesting lives that I can recall hearing about in my life. You are much younger than my grandfather was. However, I believe that the two of you would have had wonderful conversations to listen in on. He was
quite patriotic, but it was not the "Flag Waving,...We can do no wrong" type. Everyone in my family says that I "take after him". I don't think that I could fill his shoes, but like him, I don't fear invasion, we've already been invaded by greedy liars.
Polititcians, and the rich that nown them. I envy your life's experience, and I appreciate your coorespondence with me. In a way, it seems that you're from another world(being so far away), and yet you also seem to be firmly anchored to the Earth,
and it's humanity. I count you as my friend, as well as my electronics advisor.


Quote : "He mocks the people who proposes that the government shall protect the rich and that they will in turn care for the laboring poor." Grover Cleveland.