[CQ-Contest] 1977 vanity calls (was Watch your dits this weekend)

[Doug Smith]

Zack Widup wrote:
> Yep, I got one of those. Some of my friends who also got 1X2's in or around
> 1976 were K9CW, K9PW, K9DF, K9JA, W9GR, K9JM.
> 
> I was told by one of my Elmers, "Ragtime Cowby Joe" Blahunka W9RCJ, that the
> original holder of W9SZ died at Pearl Harbor and the second person to hold
> the call lived in Lansing, IL for many years. I'm the third person to have
> it.

I clearly remember the "gates".  I was in the second group.  My first two choices (W9CW and W9DS) went in the first gate; I got choice #3.  (and am 
VERY happy I didn't get #2!)

A few years ago at Dayton, I bought a complete set of 1959 QST.  Over the summer, as I was paging through, something caught my eye in the July issue. 
  It was the previous holder of my call; the announcement of his passing appeared in the Silent Keys column of July 1959 QST.

Who could have predicted that the subsequent holder of the W9WI callsign would be born that same July of 1959?

-- 

Doug Smith W9WI
Pleasant View, TN  EM66