Great ham stories, Steve.  I enjoyed hearing your experiences.  N2IC used to 
live out here in Colorado, as I recall, and always hear him everywhere.

Phil.
K0NX




----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Steve" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Wednesday, April 30, 2014 11:51 AM
Subject: Re: My view and memories about ham radio: was RE: Amateur Radio 
Licensees in U.S.


> Ok, I was going to wait until my fiftieth anniversary, but now I'm 
> inspired.
>
> I had been interested in ham radio since I was little.  My uncle, K9MYQ 
> took
> me down to his shack and demonstrated ham radio when I was in kindergarten
> or first grade, I remember he had a Viking Valiant working AM.
>
> At the Michigan School for the Blind we had a radio club.  Guys from the
> Oldsmobile Ham Club used to come and teach us.  At about the time I wrote 
> my
> Novice test, I fractured my ankle and at the hospital, an x-ray tech was a
> new Novice.  He loaned me a GR-91 Heathkit receiver, and I had gotten a
> DX-35 transmitter with cathode keying.  When I got my wn8nhw call on July 
> 9,
> 1964, I was pretty much ready to get on the air.  I remember waking my
> parents up at 1 or 2 in the morning because I got up early to be able to
> work California on 40 meters.  The other thing I remember so much was that
> damned cathode keying circuit; if you put your hand on the straight key 
> and
> missed, you could get a decent 75-volt poke.
>
> I met several local hams by working them on 7161 or 7169, those were my 
> two
> main crystals on 40.  One of them had an old 1951 MG that my older sister
> ended up buying.  He also had a cool National NC-303 receiver.  On 
> November
> 13, 1964, I got a re-conditioned NC-300 receiver from World Radio Labs, 
> and
> I had that until the late 70's.
>
> I didn't pass my Conditional in the first year, so my call expired.  I
> finally got my Conditional in 1966 at age 11.  I was excited to work voice
> for a short while.  I got a Viking Invader that ran around 200 watts PEP 
> and
> 25 watts on AM.  I worked my uncle a few times on AM and I remember 
> working
> a guy in Pittsburgh.  We had talked for an hour or so and as we were
> exchanging our 73's, he said "you know, this is the best QSO I've ever had
> with a YL."  He obviously thought my handle was Eve instead of Steve.  For
> several years after that, until puberty took over, I ran almost 
> exclusively
> CW, except when talking to friends.
>
> I well remember those days, the battle between SSB which was taking over 
> but
> there were still a lot of AM-ers left.  I also remember in 1970 or 71,
> running across some new novices that were my age or a bit younger.  They
> were sending so fast, I couldn't copy them and I thought I was a good CW 
> op.
> No damn Novice was going to be sending CW faster than I could copy.  So, I
> built my speed up to theirs, and we used to get on 80 meters for several
> years at around 45 WPM.  One member of that group of Novices is a pretty
> famous contester now, formerly WA2ICU, he is now N2IC.
>
> Funny story about Steve.  I met some hams from Kalamazoo before I went to
> University of Michigan Law School.  I was talking with Dave and Tim one
> night and telling the story of these Novices.  He said "Hey, don't you 
> know
> who Steve WA2ICU is?  He's N2IC."  I had been talking to him quite a bit 
> on
> the Ann Arbor repeater, as he was getting a Master's in Electrical
> Engineering partially paid for by his employer.  I had also gotten rid of 
> my
> old Conditional call, having since upgraded to Extra with my now-current
> K8SP call, so he didn't know who I was. So, the next time I heard him on 
> the
> air, I said "WA2ICU...I mean N2IC."  He said "how did you know my old 
> call?"
> So, I told him and we met at a bar to have an eyeball over a couple beers.
>
> I guess the only other funny story I'll tell is I bought an IC-751 when I
> was living in Spokane.  I met my wife out there who is also blind.  She 
> had
> an old Drake 2B as a teenager and had been a bit interested in ham radio
> from knowing some of the blind hams in Seattle.  She went down to the
> Handi-Hams camp and went from nothing to her General in a week.  So for 
> her
> birthday the following year, I gave her a narrow CW filter for the IC-751,
> which is something I really wanted myself.
>
> She is one of the hundreds of thousands of inactive hams now.  I think she
> is worried about how people will react to the fact that she is so
> inexperienced as an operator yet has a General license.  One day, she had 
> a
> CW QSO on 20 meters when we still lived in Spokane.  She talked with a guy
> for about fifteen minutes and was glad when she exchanged 73's.  A guy 
> from
> Yugoslavia called her back, and she wouldn't respond, she'd had enough of
> hamming except for using the OIC2AT on two meters.  Yes, Kevin, that was a
> nice HT for its time.  I still have one although I'm not sure what 
> condition
> the batteries are in now.
>
> Steve, K8SP
> Lansing, Pure Michigan
>