Hi Phil;
Thank you for the 40 years you gave us.
You have web sites which are designed to help us and you are always willing
to help a fellow ham.
It's not what you get out of the hobby but, it's what you contribute to it.
And, you have certainly contributed a lot.
I hope you have another 40 years and I hope the next 40 years let's you
enjoy the hobby even more and that you have the very best of health.
73 De Anthony W2AJV
[log in to unmask]
ECHOLINK NODE NUMBER: 74389
----- Original Message -----
From: "Phil Scovell" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Sunday, April 23, 2006 11:39 PM
Subject: [BLIND-HAMS] My 40th Ham Radio Anniversary
> Next Tuesday, it dawned on me, will be my 40th ham radio anniversary. I
> was
> 14 years young at the time I got my novice license. I was at the Nebraska
> School for the Blind. We had, normally, a DX60B and the SX99 for the
> receiver but when I got my ticket in the mail, the DX60B, as it often was,
> had to be repaired. So we hooked up a little A T 1, which I forget now
> who
> made it but it ran about 30 watts I think, and we fired it up on 80
> meters.
> My call was WN0ORO and my first contact was a guy in the same state whose
> call was WN0OHO. We became friends and hung out together on sideband for
> years. Six months later, I took my general test when the FCC came through
> Omaha and passed by the skin of my teeth. Our club station at the school
> for the blind was updated to the HT37 and a the HQ180X and we were in hog
> Heaven. My novice days were super fun with a DX20 and a BC348 receiver.
> I
> started out with a 100 foot long wire and no tuner. Just about 4 months
> into being a novice, I got the Viking Ranger 1 and used it with the same
> BC348 receiver but put up an 80 and 40 meter dipole. Wow, what a
> difference. My mom purchased for me the H A 1 T O electronic keyer and
> paddle for 75 dollars when I passed my general so I got to use the keyer
> for
> about 3 to 4 weeks on the novice bands until my general ticket came in the
> mail. Wow, did I think I was hot bananas running the keyer as a novice,
> too. In later years, I got to be good CW buddies with W9TO who designed
> the
> T O keyer I owned as a novice. When I got my General, my mom generously
> purchase for me at Christmas, a Drake TR4 and that was probably one of the
> most popular rigs of the day, besides the less expensive Galaxy and Heath
> Kit rigs. I started working DX like crazy on 20, 15, and 10 and
> eventually
> got a 3 element TH3 junior triband beam. It was mounted on an 8 foot
> tripod
> on the roof with the A R 22 rotor. The beam was probably about 25 or 28
> feet but the bands in the mid to late sixties were red hot. Believe it or
> not, I worked the bands with my Drake TR4 for the two weeks of Christmas
> vacation and then got a horrible cold and my voice was so bad, my friends
> at
> school couldn't hardly recognize me. In fact, they always said, they
> never
> would have believed I was sick and staying home from school for an extra
> week if they hadn't heard me and how I sounded on the air. Some of them
> nick named me Squeaky and still call me that when they call me on the
> phone
> to this day. I was, of course, WA0ORO till about 1979 when I passed my
> advanced and extra class tests and became AF0H, a dog of a call if I ever
> heard one, but had it until November of 1996 when I became K0NX. Hard to
> believe I have had this call now nearly 10 years and will have to renew it
> again this year for the first time. I think ham radio has been the
> funnist
> hobbies I could have ever gotten into. I could see until I was 11 years
> old
> and got interest in electronics through a TV repair friend of mine when I
> was ten. He took me on house calls and was teaching me the trade little
> by
> little. Then he showed me his DX60 and HQ129X and I was in love.
> Unfortunately, that was about the time my father died unexpectedly and a
> year later, my retinas fell apart and I was blind. So ham radio and
> electronics almost died in my life until I was on lunch break at the
> Nebraska School for the blind, sitting in the lobby, and crying my eyes
> out
> from home sickness when a guy sat down near me and started talking to me.
> I
> wished he would buzz off but couldn't blame him for trying to change my
> feelings by talking to me until he said, Do you know anything about ham
> radio? In seconds, we were in the ham shack and he was showing me the
> gear.
> Home sickness was gone. That kid became my best friends for many years
> until he passed away many years ago. We spent hundreds of hours rag
> chewing
> on the 80 meter novice bands as kids and then as generals, we talked even
> more. I have gotten into all sorts of different things as a ham but CW
> has
> always been my favorite and I don't know why. I DXed for many years until
> I
> got over 300 countries and then started DXing just on 80 and 40 meters. I
> have always enjoyed contesting, too. Now I mostly hang out on 2 meters
> but
> when the bands pick up again, I'll fire up the rig and put up some new
> antennas on the tower. I miss the old gear but I sure love all the new
> talking stuff for the blind ham that I never had before. That vinyl tape
> on
> the outer skirt of the VFO knob on my Drake TR4 sure would great, along
> with
> the 100 KHz crystal calibrator, and I always ended up close to the
> frequency
> I wanted, too. I often think back on my novice days because I had more
> fun
> that I ever dreamed during those months. I've made hundreds of friends
> from
> all over the planet, too. So, 40 years makes me feel older at 54 years of
> age but I wouldn't trade the fun I have had for thousands of hours for
> anything else. Well, sex is a close second even at my age.
>
> 73,
> Phil,
> K0NX
>
> The Zenith Tube Website
> www.RedWhiteAndBlue.org
>
>
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