Howard's comment about no one knowing we are blind on the radio unless 
we tell them brings to mind two memorable individuals from my SWL and 
early ham days as a teenager.

One was a local blind individual who, I promise you, couldn't make two 
consecutive transmissions without making some statement about being 
blind, or about what he couldn't do because he could not see. 
Naturally, a few people felt sorry for him, but most thought of him as 
a big nuisance. The irony was that he had enough useable vision to 
walk out in his yard, and tell the people who came to help him with 
antennas something like, "You need to straighten that mast up a little 
bit, don't you think?"

He never caught on to why many of his would-be helpers disappeared 
after he would make statements like that the entire time they were 
with him.

One day I got up the courage to ask my adult blind friend and role 
model, who was also a ham, what he thought of this gentleman's 
behavior.

As I recall it now, over 40 years later, my friend said: "It's 
disgusting. And don't you ever let me catch you acting that way, on or 
off the radio."

He meant it too.

Stay tuned for part 2.








Mike Duke, K5XU
American Council of Blind Radio Amateurs