Comments on: Retrotectacular: Ham Radio As It Was

By: Antti

Antti — Tue, 25 Feb 2025 21:32:09 +0000

In reply to Gardoni. Morse is actually damned nifty, travels far and not that difficult to learn. As all old things, it will regain popularity.

By: Helena

Helena — Mon, 24 Feb 2025 16:15:30 +0000

In reply to 101 Soldier. Why do you think you should be able to skip the test? If you have the knowledge, take the test and ace it. If you don't, you shouldn't be transmitting on those bands anyway, right? Put up or shut up.

By: Alan McCormick

Alan McCormick — Sun, 23 Feb 2025 21:54:06 +0000

I recognize that headset. My uncle Jerry was a longtime Bell System employee and often scavenged bits for personal projects. He gave us two of those headsets and wired them to work as walkie talkies. Pretty sure they were old operator headsets.

By: 101 Soldier

101 Soldier — Sun, 23 Feb 2025 14:42:40 +0000

As a current operator I’m surprised at the level of knowledge required to operate UHF. As a retired Army MOS 31C Single Channel Radio Operator/ UHF TTY I went to Signal School for 3 months. Operated manpacks, TacSat, AM, FM, SINCGARS in REAL combat and peacetime scenarios taking and saving lives. 3O years later one needs nearly a degree to step up to UHF from Tech to Gen license. There should be provisions to allow certified military operators to forgo certain testing. Amateur radio is exactly that….Amateur with no real consequences.

By: D

Sun, 23 Feb 2025 13:41:31 +0000

In reply to Tim Andersson.

No, Tim. He didn’t mean it like that at all.
It was special because Garth got to meet a lot of his brother’s friends, and they were from a particular community that knew each other as well, and they made the time to come to the funeral.
You’ll get more familiar with how it is special after you have attended more funerals of loved ones, perhaps.

By: Garth Wilson

Garth Wilson — Sun, 23 Feb 2025 05:32:52 +0000

It definitely brings some nostalgia. I still have a lot of 73 and QST magazines from the 60’s that were given to me, and I drooled over all the wonderful equipment I couldn’t afford yet as a mere paper boy. Then there was the magic of visiting Henry Radio in Anaheim, CA. One of my mentors had a marvelous Kenwood-equipped shack and a 70′ tower. Another one had Swan equipment. I did become very active on QRP CW, and talked to people all over the world on my Heathkit HW-8 with a couple of watts and a random-length wire antenna and a good home-made transmatch that could match any reasonable antenna to 50Ω+j0. Besides budget, one of the reasons I enjoyed CW was that the more-serious hams were on CW, and I could talk technical rather than hear them talk about their wives’ flower garden or curse their enormous shoe collection. Getting married and moving out of my parents’ house and into an apartment that didn’t allow antennas kind of ended my ham activity. Seven years later, my wife and I bought this house, but other interests had taken over. I have maintained my license so I could jump back in at any time. It might be kind of like tape recorders though. I like tape recorders, and I would enjoy owning a Nagra, but at this point I have very little use for one. (BTW, I’m not the same Garth who replied above.)

By: Gardoni

Gardoni — Sun, 23 Feb 2025 05:24:28 +0000

In reply to jacobchrist. 1968 was 57 years ago. Assuming those ladies were about 15 at the time, they're now in their 70s. Times change, move on instead of pretending that beep bop morse will someday be the main method of communication again.