How it all started…

I don’t think I was much older than about ten or eleven.  There I sat, messing with an old Sony AM radio, one with a knob with “MW,” “SW1”, and “SW2”.  Not that I really knew what those abbreviations meant back then.  Just out of curiosity, I turned the knob to SW1.  At first, as I turned the tuning knob, I heard a whole bunch of nothing.  Static.  White noise.  

But when I passed by the 5 on the dial, I heard what sounded like a telephone dial tone that clicked every second, just like a clock and telephone together.  Suddenly, the dial tone disappeared, and all I heard were clicks, then a female voice that said, “At the tone, 5 hours, 47 minutes Coordinated Universal Time.”  Then a beep.  Then the dial tone again.

I didn’t realize it then, but I had heard WWVH for the first time. That was the first time I realized that radio encompassed more than just the AM and FM dial.

As I came back to that radio again and again, I made further discoveries.  Weird beeping and twittering on certain frequencies.  Then voices.  Voices coming from faraway lands like China, Japan, Australia, New Zealand, Britain.  I had stumbled on a new world – the world of world band, or shortwave, radio.

I still listen to shortwave now and again.  I don’t have that Sony radio anymore, but I’ve since traded it in for a Grundig S350, which I still listen to every once in a while.

As I learned more about the shortwave bands, and found out that amateur radio operators occupied several parts of the shortwave bands, I think I probably thought a few times about becoming a ham.  What deterred me was the fact that in order to get a license, I needed to learn Morse Code. 

Morse Code?!?  It seems easier to learn ancient Greek.  Or so I thought.

Since then the Morse code requirements were modified, then eliminated entirely in February.  What finally gave me the motivation I needed was the story of Ron Hashiro, AH6RH, who made contact with the International Space Station and the first space tourist, Charles Simonyi.

Ron’s exploits made our company newsletter (we both work in the Information Systems department at HMSA). Then, as I browsed our local Barnes & Noble I ran across the “red book,” the ARRL Ham Radio License Manual.  At that point some thing just clicked.

I bought the book and devoured it in less than a month’s time, passing my Technician exam on June 20.

Since then, Ron has been a valuable resource in helping me get started. He invited me to my first Field Day, and I was intrigued by all the different radios there and made my first IRLP contact with a ham in Alaska.  He even lent me an antenna, radio, and power supply to get started.  I’ve since gotten a dual-band walkie and a dual band radio of my own.

So…that’s the story so far.  I’ve gotten the General level manual and have been studying it in my free time, with a goal of upgrading within the year.  I imagine, though, that even after I’ve had my Extra for twenty years, I’ll still be learning new things.