Amateur Radio

Photograph by Chris Nelson

I became interested in Amateur Radio during the summer of 1952.

I 'hung out' with a kid, on the weekends, that lived near one of my Grandparents' homes and his father was a General Class amateur radio operator, who had built 'all' of his equipment; including a very large beam antenna mounted on a 75 foot [telephone style] pole.

On Saturday mornings we would get together before kids' radio shows began and communicate with anyone who was willing to talk to us via amateur radio using morse code.

(fwiw) Television signals did not reach this area, at that time, and the only form of corporate media was AM radio, 78 RPM records, 45 RPM records, and movies.

I eventually ended up with a 1st Class F.C.C. license which allowed me to work in radio and television, and an Amateur Extra Class F.C.C. license, N6ECT, which allowed me to do, what I consider, some 'neat' things.

For example, I was able to receive pictures from the "Mars Lander" via J.P.L. (Jet Propulsion Laboratory) using SSTV (amateur slow scan television) from my home:

Photograph by Dwight Dolliver

communicate with MIR, the Soviet Space Station (from my home):

and with the Spacecraft Columbia; special thanks to NASA (from my home):

Another reason I like Amateur Radio is because most operators provide free Community Service for their area and beyond. The following are a few of the many things I have participated in.

During the 1970s, Fred Bray, KE6CD (Emergency Coordinator Radio Communications) and I (Emergency Coordinator Data Communications) provided the Mayor's Office of Emergency Services a complete FREE Emergency Disaster & Evacuation plan for the City of San Francisco, as a service of the Amateur Radio community.

Western Field Office
1870 Ogden Drive
P.O. Box 909
Burlingame, California 94010
(415) 692-5201

American Red Cross

May 20, 1986

Dear Curtis,

What a pleasure it was to work with you during the disaster! I learned so much, and was able to relay it in a coherent manor to the DWI [Department of Welfare Inquiry] Task Force. It helped so much when we wrote our proposal to National Headquarters and they bought it all. I'm sure the little chart you drew was a big help -- Stan Sneed came to our final planning meeting and gave a good deal of computer type input too. Now we begin the search for funds!

You were so terrific to hang in and do so much to make the DWI operation work -- and we appreciated it so very much.

Helen R. Smith

San Francisco CommuniTree - 1978
In Memory of Dean Gengle

Fairwitnessing

Index

Pacific Packet Radio Society - PPRS

PPRS - http://www.pprs.org/

Amateur Radio Public Seismic Network - ARPSN

ARPSN - ARPSN

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