[TowerTalk] First QSO 55th Anniversary

[Gene Smar]

Gents:

     April 11 was the 55th anniversary of my first QSO.  I was 14 at the
time.  It was Easter Monday 1966 and I had spent all weekend trying to get a
silly antenna from Pop Electronics working on 80 and 40 meters.  The antenna
was two sections of EMT mechanically coupled together (that was the first
problem) and then connecting to two sets of guy wires at the top that were
supposed to bring the array into resonance on 80 and 40 M.  I think I used a
Coke bottle (remember them?) as a base insulator but used a heavy cardboard
mailing tube to "insulate" the first couple of feet of EMT from the mounting
bracket that was lag bolted into the back yard wooden fence.  I tried to
solder the coax center conductor to the base of the EMT (second big
problem.)  I also bolted the twisted coax shield to an aluminum clothes line
prop (not sure how many of you even know what that is) that I had "borrowed"
from my mother and driven into the dirt aside of the Coke bottle.

     I won't bore you with details of my first two pages of logbook entries.
Suffice it so say that they were filled with identical entries of "CQ"
followed by "NO QSO," all on the same 7 MC freq of my sole 40M Novice band
crystal.

     On that Monday morning (a school holiday) I decided to reconfigure the
antenna materials into a single 40M dipole.  As our house lot was about 70
feet deep, it fit perfectly North-to-South.  I used the EMT to support the
"hot" end of the dipole but the shield-connected end of the insulated house
wire had to touch the peak of the roof and lie on the asphalt shingles.
This is important.

     I managed to jump the four feet off the roof onto the front porch roof
and into my bedroom window safely and ran down to the kitchen where I had
set up my Knight-Kit T-60/R55A station.  I tuned up the T-60 (no SWR bridge
yet so I was hoping I could get the thing to load properly) and started to
call "CQ" again.  In between transmit attempts I tuned around my crystal
freq with the R-55A, listening for replies.

     After the third "CQ" (I logged every one of them), I heard my callsign
coming back to me.  Due to my excitement I missed the callsign of the other
station so I sent "QRZ?" (not bad for a Novice!) and heard my callsign
coming back again.  This time I heard ".DE VE2AOU K."  I am quite sure I
stopped breathing for a few seconds before I shouted, to anyone and to no
one in particular, "I'M TALKING TO CANADA!"

     I continued with the QSO, shakily copying what information I could from
this obviously experienced and kind foreign Ham who deigned to talk with an
American Novice and sent him my street address and town so I could make it
easier for him to send his QSL card.  (QRZ.COM was just a glimmer in N7IKQ's
eyes at the time, I'm quite sure.  And the Callbook was something I'd have
to save up for for quite a long time.)

     Remember that wire draped over our roof shingles?  At this point in the
QSO I heard my mother, who had been cleaning in our second floor bedrooms,
yell down to me, "What are you doing down there?"  Obviously, I couldn't
disrupt my contact with a foreign Ham; I kept asking for his mailing address
at about 5 WPM.  That's when the power to my station failed and the
equipment panels went dark.  My mother had come into my shack (her kitchen)
and literally pulled the plug on my first QSO.  Apparently my 60 Watts of
Novice-frequency RF was finding its way into the second floor light fixture
from the antenna wire only feet away on the other side of the ceiling and
causing the ten-Watt bulb to blink on and off with my Morse transmissions.
If I recall her words correctly, I believe she said something like, "You're
gonna blow up the house."  

     I explained to her that it was just me sending signals to my first Ham
contact - he was in CANADA, Mom!  I told her I could fix the problem (I had
hoped.)  I found a 25 Watt bulb and installed it in place of the 10-Watter.
I replugged my station into the wall outlet and did a quick "VVV VVV VVV DE
WN3EWV" to prove to my mother - and to myself - that my theory of "the
antenna wires are too close to the bulb" was correct.

     A Happy Ending:  About a week later I received a QSL card from Ron Trew
VE2AOU.  It included my full Novice callsign but misspelled first name, a
"?" for the surname and no house number in the address.  It took me only two
seconds to realize that one of my Elmer's (and I've forgotten his callsign
after all these years) had worked at the local post office (18218) and
recognized me as the likely Novice.  He made sure I got the card.

     I added dipole wires for 80M and 20M to that initial 40M set and had a
blast on the bands from home for a few years until I went away to college.
(My first DX was on that 20M wire - G3GHB.)  Four years later I graduated
from college with a BSEE and continued my Hamming with my first Drake
station (TR-3CW.)  Since then I've enjoyed many, but certainly not all,
aspects that our fine hobby has to offer.  I've made friends along the way
and learned quite a bit of esoterica that has helped me professionally.
(Like sunspots can wreak havoc with the electric grid or that 900 MHz and
2.7 GHz signals ordinarily don't travel very far.)


73 de
Gene Smar  AD3F
Rockville, MD