Problems with Hollingsworth\'s License Modification

n6ayj writes "Riley Hollingsworth's license modification issued to KC6PQW, Ted R. Sorenson, III, represents the first time I'm aware of that a ham has retained one of the major Washington, D.C. law firms which normally represent broadcasters to challenge the Commission's action.


George L. Lyon, Jr., Mr. Sorenson's attorney, wrote Mr. Hollingsworth a most interesting letter concerning Hollingsworth's attempt to modify Mr. Sorenson's license, which may be read at http://www.geocities.com/the435truth/ Now the question is: are all of the license modifications which Mr. Hollingsworth has issued fatally defective because they denied the licensee due process by not notifying him of his/her right to a hearing? Bill Crowell, N6AYJ"

 

I listened to the MP3 that the SWL posted of this farce. How can there be any question?


- Some Ham Radio history, Apparently the "Old Man" had plans for this sort of foul behavior. See - "Wouff Hong." I rather enjoyed the Rttysnitch and Uggerumph discriptions myself. Anyhow here it is -

Rotten Young Squirts
By The Old Man
Feb 1932 QST Magazine
SAY, you modern Young Squirts! Listen to me.



In bygone years, when amateur radio was young and in the making, it was Unpopular to have a
rotten fist, send with your feet or send too many CQ's.



It was Unhealthful, very, to be outside the regular amateur bands.



It was Sure Death to fake a call or send any kind of a false signal.



There were three gadgets that were devised by the amateurs of those early days to keep Young
Squirts constantly reminded of these three
important don'ts of amateur radio.



A Squirt who used too much of what we used to call "Lake Erie Swing," or sent with a slobbery
fist, or cluttered up the air with too many CQ's, or garbled his call letters so they had to be
guessed at, was called upon by a committee, the chairman of which was a big brute with a
positive manner and who exhibited and explained the workings of an instrument known as an
Uggerumph. A Squirt who was a band-jumper, or who failed to maintain an intimate
acquaintance with a reliable wavemeter, was politely knocked on the head with a baseball bat,
dragged out into the nearest sandlot, and subjected to a surgical operation with a thing called a
Rettysnitch. The blood of each victim was allowed to dry on this tool. She's all caked up on the
business end at this minute. The next time you meet old Fred Schnell ask him how many Squirts
he butchered the first year or so after the War, with this Rettysnitch. He nearly wore it out. He
was Traffic Manager in those days.



Last but by no means least, a Squirt who even thought of using a false call, let alone actually
using one, or used profane language on the air or who willfully broke up other legitimate amateur
traffic, was taken for a certain kind of a ride during which an instrument of torture known as a
Wouff Hong figured very prominently. No Young Squirt ever returned from one of these "rides."
The Wouff-Hong was carefully wiped off after the affair and the rag used to do the wiping was
forwarded to me for filing away. There are twenty five bales of these bloody rags in a certain
warehouse at the present moment, and recently I have made arrangements to hire some
additional space.



Now, I don't want to be unpleasant or to threaten anybody, but by the Great Horn Spoon, you
modern Young Squirts, you are riding for a sure fall if you keep on the way some of you are
going. The other night I counted one of you send forty-one CQ's and then, to add insult to injury,
you ended up with just two miserably sent slobbery signs that could not be read by Handy
himself.



Now I ask you -- why forty-one CQ's if two unreadable calls? What sort of a think-tank do you
carry around that led you to sign only twice and rotten at that, if you thought forty-one CQ's were
called for? Rut I must not permit myself to dwell upon your offense for fear this paper will get
afire. Just, let me say that I've got my eagle eye on you and any moment you may expect to
receive a call from my committee, the leader of which will take such steps as may be necessary
to convey to you a clear and distinct idea of just what the Uggerumph is, what it can do, how it is operated
and how it feels.



Another one of you Young Squirts spent the other evening sending V's. You washed out a
perfectly good rag chew for me and ditched several words from an important QST from W1MK.
And you, you rubber-head who did this, you are going to be hounded down and I'll see that you
are made to eat every V in the dictionary. In the old days we would have boiled you in
transformer oil. I reckon you are too young to know what transformer oil is. Well, son -- it's hot,
when it's boiling.



Another one of you thinks it funny to send with your feet instead of your hand. It cannot be
done, son, and it isn't funny. It's rotten amateur radio. Nobody can read your stuff, and what's
the use of sending if nobody can receive it? If your stuff were to be taken down on a tape
receiver it would bust the machine wide open and hurt somebody. There are only two characters
in the telegraphic code. One is a dot and the other is a dash. You seem to think it fashionable to crossbreed the two. It can't be done without getting into trouble
and you are in trouble because you are to be located and some dark night you are going to be
yanked from your warm little shack and a certain committee will heat up a certain pair of irons
and several real distinct dots and dashes will be branded upon that part of your anatomy which
will remind you of dots and dashes every time you sit down, for the rest of your life.



I am ashamed to say that three of you are suspected of using some other chap's call letters! On
a certain occasion, of which I have record, one of this three had the gawd-awful bad judgment to
use a certain Assistant Radio Supervisor's call, (Imagine such a thing, Old Timers!) I don't state
what we intend to do with this one. Anyway, the whole bunch of you are slated for the Wouff-
Hong, and Lord have mercy on you for nobody else will, especially for the poor unfortunate
gargoyle who used the R. S.'s call letters.



It will be my duty to attend to this squad and I have already sent to Hartford for the Wouff-
Hong to be forwarded out here by air mail. You enemies of amateur radio will soon be hearing
the old pre-war torture chanty, "Fe, Fi, Fo, Fum," A horrible example will be made of you for the
benefit of future Young Squirts who are tempted to stray from the straight and narrow. After the
committee and I get through with you your bones will be ground up to make breakfast rolls for
me and the little wife, and I suspect that Kitty and the kittens will get parts of you.



I have not decided yet what the torture shall be for those miserable whops who splash around in
the ether and get afoul of the transatlantic 'phone bands. It's a serious offense. It gets all the rest
of us in dutch with the Government and
A. T, & T. No precedent exists because we did not use to have transatlantic radio 'phone. This
matter is up with the Torture Committee of A.R.R.L. and as soon as something sufficiently blood-
curdling can be devised we shall rig up
the apparatus and bring you whops in.



I am in favor of stringing all of you up by the thumbs in good old seafaring style, while
somebody with a deep voice and slow delivery reads one of Handy's papers on Dynatrons and
Methods of Monitoring Frequency, after which all the worn-out and inaccurate wavemeters in
your Division will be crammed down your throats.



The idea is to endeavor to make you "frequency conscious." I reckon it will conscious you up all
right, especially about the time you feel some of those crooked condenser plates going down.



One of the suggestions the Torture Committee is working on is to have Warner suggest to the
forthcoming Madrid Conference the advisability of compelling all amateurs to eat at least one
dynatron before he learns the code. It's a hot idea
according to my notion, because if an aspirant for an amateur transmitting license knows what it
is to eat a dynatron he will have acquainted himself with what accurate checking of frequency
really means. Any amateur that gags much on a dynatron won't feel much like learning the code
for the remainder of his days on earth.



This idea, if put into practice, would choke off the supply of new non-frequency-conscious
Young Squirts. We should then have to deal only with the existing Squirts who don't know what
accurate frequency means. Gradually we could Wouff-Hong these out of the picture. Then we
should be able to live in peace and comfort with the Government and the A.T.&T., a condition
devoutly to be desired, if amateur radio is to weather Madrid and if Warner is to retain his
reason.



This concludes my warning to you public enemies. It has been a long time since this old
barnacle has opened his trap, but after things reached the pass where one of you Young Squirts
pinched the Radio Supervisor's call, I had to speak. I am here to see that amateur radio retains
its traditions, built in bygone years, when amateurs were loyal, law-respecting and upstanding he-
Americans, who were proud of their fists both on the key and in the lawbreakers' faces, proud of
their procedure, proud of their note, proud of their frequency, proud of their delivered-message
percentages and proud of the splendid standing of amateur radio. The Uggerumph, the
Rettysnitch and the Wouff-Hong have seved in the past, well and terribly. They can serve
again.



You present generation of Young Squirts are too young to know the past. It is not recorded. It
could not be. But believe me, there was a past. You don't want to have the vengeance of
outraged amateur radio wreaked upon you. It's too awful. So -- let this old crab's warning be
heeded. Remember the traditions of amateur radio when it comes to fists, CQing, V's and using
fake calls.


Fail not -- at your peril!