[RFI] Tracking Electrical Interference in 1924

Paul Christensen pchristensen at ieee.org
Wed Jan 27 09:07:50 EST 2021


Using Brigg's description of the arcing street light location (i.e., 2nd pole on School St. off Washington), the pole location and surrounding neighborhood can be easily seen using Google street maps.  In those old neighborhoods, it's highly likely that even though the wood poles have been changed through the years, the pole positions mostly remained the same.  

Last year, I attended a funeral of a childhood friend in Dwight, IL.  On that visit, I searched for the home of G. Wiley Bergman, 9CA.  Wiley was a prolific spark operator in the early '20s.  Bergman's station was described in a 1923 issue of QST.  Taking that issue with me, I located the home and found the antenna lead-in entry point, just as shown in the QST photos.   The house looks the same today as it did in 1923.  QST photos also show placement of several utility poles.  I compared placement against the photos, and they're at the same locations today. 

Paul, W9AC  

-----Original Message-----
From: Stephanie WX3K <wx3k at ptd.net>
Sent: Tuesday, January 26, 2021 7:03 PM
To: Paul Christensen <pchristensen at ieee.org>
Cc: RFI at contesting.com
Subject: Re: [RFI] Tracking Electrical Interference in 1924

Paul

Thank you for sharing this. Interesting how we can point to this as another example of our “expertise” way back then !

73
Stephanie WX3K


> On Jan 26, 2021, at 6:54 PM, Paul Christensen <pchristensen at ieee.org> wrote:
> 
> For those interested, I have linked to a 1924 QST article that 
> discusses how Perry Briggs, 1BGF (of "low-loss" tuner fame), tracked down an arcing street
> lamp through the Hartford, CT neighborhoods.   Nearly 100 years later, we're
> still doing the same, albeit with better tracking gear:
> 
> https://www.arrl.org/files/file/Technology/tis/info/pdf/2403034.pdf
> 
> Paul, W9AC
> 
> 
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