HamRadioNow: 100 Years of Ham Radio Experience

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[TD]Episode 186:[/TD]
[TD]100 Years of Ham Experience[/TD]
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This may be a little personal for a QRZ.com news item, but last Sunday (January 11) marked the start of my 50th year as a ham. January 11 was a Monday afternoon in 1965 , and when I got home from school, that eagerly awaited Novice license was in the mailbox: WN9NSO. I had a station ready to operate (because my brother was already a Novice), so I immediately got on the air.

This January 11, I recorded a show with another ham who was a Novice back then, too. Rich Casey N5CSU appeared in my early log as WN9LRI​. Between us, we now have 100 years of hamming. So this is a serious nostalgia-fest.

[video=youtube;B-owWhOy2hk]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B-owWhOy2hk[/video]​

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THANK YOU to all our contributors!​

 

Gary,
That was great. I really loved the old FM stuff. I remember Spectronics well. That's where several of us here on the West Coast got the parts and pieces to put some HT-220's together with.

I did a presentation of the history of 2 Meter portables a while back for our club. Most people there had never seen the old stuff we had to work with in the early days of FM. I started off the show with a Motorola packset with the peanut tubes, then HT-200, HT-220, MT-500, and MT-1000. Threw in the first Japanese HT that I remember, the Standard SRC-146.

Keep up the good work. About the only thing I remember from that era that you did not mention and maybe you did not use it back there was tone burst for repeater access.

Joe WA7JAW

 

Wow Joe, I didn't even think about tone burst. The 76 repeater the Rich and I were talking about for the Chicago FM club required 1800 Hertz tone burst. Another 76 repeater with overlapping coverage required 2000 hz tone burst. I never had it built into my radio, but I learned to whistle with 90% reliability first try!

 

Good going on the 50 years!!!! March 15th will mark my completion of 60 years of Ham Radio. I don't even remember the term, repeater, even being used when I first started, but I do remember starting with homebrew equipment placed in racks and weighing in at about 300 lbs assembled and using an old BC-348 receiver which was still in use when SSB came into being. Original callsign was KN2LVD Novice and upgraded to K2LVD. Since then have held callsigns: W5ORA, W2EGP, N5EEC and back to W5ORA(vanity callsign). Needless to say a lot has changed over the last six decades. To wit: solid state radios, computers, amplifiers just to mention a few. Keep up the good work. 73's Bill W5ORA

 

Congrats on making it 50 years. I too just made 50 years this past Sept 4,2014. I worked in the two way commercial business for many years and for Motorola MSS's. I did a lot of bench work on Ht's and I finish up as a Senior Field Tech. Laying in the snow and mud working on outside cabinet equipment. Lots of fun. A lot of difference in radio equipment from the late 1960's to early 2000's when I retired. From mostly tube type radio's to computer radio's and
all solid state RF Power amplifiers. But RF propagation is RF propagation and that what they
are not teaching in our schools.

Bill W0WFH

 

Darn Gary ...... I just passed 45 years in this crazy ever-changing "hobby" (obsession)! I listen when I can and enjoy the informative shows. Thanks for many a good evening of "radio without having to speak" (on my part).

From Senility Central ----- Old Man Donnie