[SECC] My First Sweepstakes - the continuing saga

[David Thompson]

Since the phone SS is coming up I remember my first
SS.  I was 14 years and 10 months old (young) and had my General for all of
5 months.  In 1958 the Phone SS was nearly 100% AM not SSB.  I think I knew
my HQ-110 receiver quite well by then and my dad and I finally finished
(with the help of master builder W5KHB) the 4-400 amp (class C not linear)
modulated by a pair of 811A's.  W5IHP (my Elmer) loaned us a big Eldico
plate transformer so we could complete the power supply.  This was all in a
6 foot rack we made from angle iron and plywood which I painted what was
called then radio green silk.  For TVI we glued aluminum foil inside each
piece of plywood.

I was all set for antennas with a Gonset 3 el tri-bander on a 50 foot
telephone pole and two dipoles crossing for 40 and my homebrew all band trap
dipole for 80/75.  I found out quickly that my weakness was the switching.
A big toggle switch switched the power and antenna relay and after a few
hours my hands got tired.  I borrowed a weak (2 actually) 4-125A's from Gus
W5GRP so we could cut the power back to 150 watts input to get the power
multiplier (you could not win with high power).  I had Gus and the local
club president sign a statement that I was running 150 watts
and I remember Ellen White at ARRL sent me a note saying she believed me and
this was not necessary HI.

These were the days of hand logs and W5IHP gave me some of the ARRL dupe
sheets (I am sure N4PN and K4BAI remember those).  After three hours it was
apparent that just using the dupe sheets was not enough.  Working a W4 and
then a W8 meant turning over the dupe sheet.  My dad dug out an old swivel
table and the dupe sheet for W1-5 was put on one side and W6 to 0 on the
other.  It was impossible to keep track so you marked the log and used your
free time to bring the dupe sheet up to date.

How was tome available to bring the dupe sheet up to date?  in 1958 the SS
covered 2 weekends and you operated 40 (max) out of 73 hours.  This left
enough time to bring it up to date but you still had to sharpen your memory
as you often had more than 100 calls to fill in from your log.

The first weekend I made just over 400 QSO's and my then rival W5DQK was
nearly 100 QSos ahead.  I got baptism by fire when I gave my #71 to K6EVR
and Ron sent my #180 (this after just over 2 hours!).
I was about ready to quit but my dad said keep on trucking as I was a
contest newby.

I did not realize that most made 75% of their contacts the first weekend and
mopped up sections the second.  I ran the second weekend (even then there
was less activity late).  I finished ahead of W5DQK 821 to 777 QSos.  Ron
K6EVR came in first with 970 QSos and I placed third and got my picture in
QST.

I had two changes to make for 1959... get push to talk and add a HC-10 rear
end to the HQ-110.  I ran double paper routes to pay for the HC-10 and my
dad
wired the PTT out of his own pocket.

Do I want to go back to the old days...not on your life!!

73 Dave K4JRB