HAM PR: Mother Goose Parade

Every year, on the Sunday before Thanksgiving, a grand parade is held in El Cajon, California that has grown to be one of the largest in the world. Only surpassed by the Rose Parade in Pasadena. the Mother Goose parade has floats, beautfiul girls (Queens and Princesses), Horses, Marching bands from all over the country, Balloon characters and, at last, Santa Claus.

But one of the Floats is devoted to Amateur Radio!

The Amateur Radio Club of El Cajon, headed by club Prez Paul Rios KC6QLS, has had a float every year for as long as I can remember, featuring live Amateur rigs on the air during the parade route. This year, Paul's tow Vehicle held ARRL Section Manager Steve Early AD6VI and Red Flag (Cal Fire)Patrol GURU Rich Beisigl N6NKJ. Piloting the vehicle with Paul was club VP Steve Weed KO4QT.
On the Float running the rigs was Carl Cookson KI6FIF, and myself (WA6MHZ, Curator, Crest Radio Museum) Running shotgun was WAMO net master Mike Oberbauer KG6TDP, Linda Weed KI6JUD, Mike Martak AE6CQ, and Ann Rios KC6TBG.

I ran the HF rig, a Kenwood TS-2000X, hooked up to Paul's Screwdriver antenna on his fancy Ford SUV. Carl ran VHF from a Kenwood TS-711A to keep in touch with the many club members along the route and at home monitoring. To keep the world up to date on the Float's progress, a specially built portable APRS Tracker (WA6MHZ-15) provided a perfect track of the Parade. I ran SSB and CW, but 20 Meters was a poor choice for such close in skip and though many members could be heard, they had a hard time pulling me out of the QRM. Many other station across the country were heard though I was primarily trying to work other club members.

The Parade was recorded for broadcast on TV and seen live in some parts of the country. It will be shown locally here on Thanksgiving. The MC's gave a description of how our members support the VIP Red Flag Patrol for Cal Fire by driving around during high fire danger times looking for anything suspicious or actual fires sprouting. The Float also represented SANDARC, the council of all the clubs in the San Diego area.

Though most of the time was spent waving to the massive crowds on the streets, many QSOs did occur during the several mile drive along the Parade route. Next year, we will be trying to tow our 100ft portable Tower Trailer which is incredibly impressive. Last year, I had a 1934 Philco Cathedral radio on the float from the Museum.

This was GREAT PR for Ham Radio, and shows there is a very active, community minded group of volunteers ready to serve with Emergency Communications when the need arises.

 

Mother Goose Parade

I grew up in El Cajon. One of my earliest memories as a small child,
was of being perched upon my Granpa's shoulders and watching the parade go by. We were at the old Safeway store at Main and Taft. One year my sister was in the parade as a baton twirler.

Mike
KD7VRG

 

How ironic that just over the hill in San Diego an ordinance has been passed making it illegal to have a ham radio antenna that is not able to be completely lowered to the ground and has not been hidden from view from public thoroughfares.

That's great PR for ham radio and great fun for you guys, I am sure! If I still lived down that way I would have been sure to stop by. I hope that folks like you can change the minds of the (corrupt) officials in San Diego.

 

Someone needs to introduce San Diego to PRB-1, or whatever the number is.

They don't sound very accomodating.

 

The problem in San Diego is due mostly to one guy in La Jolla who put up a spectacular tower (with all the proper permits and inspections all done to the book). But his cranky swanky neighbors didn't like that it interfered with their view of the ocean. Never mind that trees obstructed far more of the view than the Tower and antenna ever did. Not interested were they that he kept it cranked all the way down until he needed to use it. They just didn't like the looks of it. Being in the most Affluent part of San Diego city, they had council members in their pocket. They led a great campaign to do away with ALL Ham antennas, but that was summarily defeated when the legal councils told the city that they better not try to ban them. So they installed some draconian regulations that make it very difficult to Hams to put up more antennas. Meanwhile, in Crest, I can put up anything I can afford. The neighbors have no problem whatsoever with them, though they might think the aluminum forest looks a little quaint and gaudy. But, as long as I don't jam their reception of the Chargers game, not a problem! Hams CAN put up antennas in San Diego City provided they jump through the right hoops. But the one hitch almost all forget about is that all these regulations apply only to GROUND MOUNTED antennas. Put up a roof tower and you are not under the regulations. You might not be able to hold up a Steppir Monstir on a roof tower, but you can put up a nice tribander and all the VHF/UHF antennas you dare. I have 2 roof towers that work great. Most of the houses in SDG have old TV antennas roof mounted that no one complains about. So Ham antennas in San Diego are not hopeless. Just have to follow the procedure.

 

Do a little dance

It looks like that if you were having a house built from scratch or doing some remodelling it wouldn't be too difficult to reinforce one area of the roof and walls specifically to support any size tower that you wished to put up.

I think that this, once done would give the county dungeon masters nightmares. Let's say you built an earthquake/tornado shelter into the house with all the proper heavy steel columns and concrete, wouldn't it support a very nifty tower and beam -- even in an earthquake?

KF7CG

 

Mother Goose Parade

Pat, I grew up in El Cajon and have fond memories of the Mother Goose Parade. I was a teenager in 1965 and was in the local REACT club. I remember providing communications support. I can remember "Happy Hare" of KCBQ (1170) radio fame being the grand marshall and driving his "Haremobile". Those were the days. When I sold my Mothers house in August 2003, I found Happy Hare on KPOP 1360 (formerly KGB radio). It was great to hear him again. The only other radio personality I have fond memories of (besides Wolfman Jack) was Hal Lewis better known as Aku on KGMB 590 radio (Honolulu) early 70's.

73, Bill KEØXQ
Omaha, NE

ke0xq@cox.net

 

Whoa Bill... You mean you don't remember the famous "Shotgun Tom Kelly"??
A San Diego radio DJ icon.

Mike
KD7VRG

 

Shotgun "Tom" Kelley

Seems I do remember him. I enlisted in the USAF in March 1968. I only came back to El Cajon after that only on leave/vacation. I did meet a lady at our church last Sunday, that lives just a block away from where my parents did. AM Radio here in Omaha is mainly talk radio. We do have KOMJ (1490) that plays hits from the 40's up unitl the 70's. We have 2 that are Spanish speaking. On the weekends, you can find a few playing Polka music. I used to work at Tel-Rad Electronics on Main Street, before I enlisted. The owner said he could get me out of going in the military - yea right! I spent 10.5 years in the USAF working on teletype and crypto gear. Now I service ATM's. My wife is from here (KB0FSI). I went to work for AT&T out of the AF, then worked for NCR and now am working for a small company (no benefits). Thank goodness the wife has benefits with her employer. Incidentally, my parents lived at 1191 Wayside Avenue. I am not real active on the air, although I do check into a few HF nets (Nebraska type) during the week and get on a few of the local repeaters. I was Section Manager for 10 years and got burned out and frustrated on that.

73, Bill

 

Mom Goose, radio parts and antennas

... I used to work at Tel-Rad Electronics on Main Street, before I enlisted.
....
73, Bill[/QUOTE]

I used to buy parts at the Tel-Rad at Swift and University in East San Diego back in the '60s and from the cheap tube guy at University and 42nd. The antenna rage comes from folks afraid of their 'property value' being diminished...especially in real estate driven SoCal. Maybe now the real estate bubble has broken antennas won't hurt so much ;^).

73
edZ KG6UTS

 

Tel-Rad Electronics

The guys that I worked for (Larry and his brother Al) owned 2 stores. I did buy some cheap tubes as well from that place. I worked there about 2 years before going in the USAF. Had fun working there. We sold a lot of tubes. There were about a dozen tube testers as you came in the front door. Also sold EICO kits, stereo gear and lots of other stuff. We even had a guy that fixed TV's and radios.

73, Bill KEØXQ

 

Shotgun Tom Kelley.

Tom is now the afternoon "drive" DJ at KEarth101 in LA. I used to work with Tom for a short time about 38 years ago at a Top 40 AM station in Bakersfield, KAFY. The "Big 55" as it was called. Back in the days when even DJs at directional AMers had to have a First Class Radiotelephone. Yeah, he went to "cram" school in LA to get his. I was the station's chief engineer.

Tom made the "big time." He replaced the Real Don Steele, on the station, following Steele's death. Big bucks for sure.

I could go on and on about the syndicated Drake Chenault Boss Radio network, but probably of no interest. The old days were great. Now the big AM names are mostly running Spanish junk, ala KHJ in LA and KYNO in Fresno.
KGB's probably doing the same.

There's a guy in SD that's a relic of KGB and KCBQ. John Barcroft. K6AM. Used to use "Johnnie B" on the air, as I remember. He was/is chief engineer for one of them. You might get hold of him to form a "ham radio posse" to get the SD council back on track......

As to the parade in "The Coffin" land, that's cool. Murphy's Junk ought to kick in some bodacious relics for your next float as well....... That's THE best surplus store I've ever set foot in. Anywhere. He got nailed, I think, though, for some of the exotic, current issue mil spec gear he sold. He posted a message about a lot of it being "recalled." I wonder where it came from?

73.

 

The good old days of AM radio..

In Omaha, we have one station that plays music from the 40's thru the 70's. I am sure that will come to an end soon. We have one FM and 2 AM Spanish stations. Back in the early 80's, a station (KEDS 1420), had a short life with an oldies format, complete with vintage commercials. We had some great stations when I came here in 1974 - WOW, KOIL to name a few. We even had a station (KOOO) you could call requests in on the CB radio. Those days are gone forever. Most of the stuff stations play these day is nothing but garbage as far as I am concerned. I used to get a laugh listening to XEMO
(860) when Curtis Springer was on. He had a cure for everything from calluses(sp) to constipation. He was nothing but a crook, but it was entertainment.

73, Bill KEØXQ
Omaha, NE