I WAS BORN...
in Washington DC in 1944. In my freshman year of high school I joined the Pennridge H.S. Amateur Radio Club, and received my novice license. KN3HTZ was my first call, and I soon upgraded to K3HTZ. Traffic handling, DXing, and contesting were my earliest interests as a ham. While in college I was invited to operate with W3HHK (now W3OV), a member of the Frankford Radio Club. I became a member, operated at W3WJD (now N3RS) a few times and then began operating single op in the ARRL DX, CQ WW and SS events. I managed to operate all the major contests throughout my college and dental school years.
K3HTZ, the station I used while in college. The HQ 170 was my second receiver, replacing an S20R. The transmitter was a DX40 Heathkit, with an ARC-5 40 meter VFO and VF1 80 meter vfo. A homebrew pair of 813's was setting in a rack behind me. The photo below is me operating at W3WJD (now N3RS) in the late 1960s
In 1970, we ran a small multi multi from a converted chicken coop on a farm owned by my father. Dad found a nice hill top , and dropped some hints that it would be a better radio location. I purchased the cabin and built a multi multi station which I maintained into the early 1980's. My only single op effort from the new hill top resulted in a third place finish in the CQWW CW in 1970. That was my last serious single op effort in the 70's.
This was a full size 3 element 40 meter beam on a 150 foot high tower. That 48 foot boom is now the bottom 48 feet of the 80 meter 1/4 wave vertical I am using today. |
This view of the hill top, shows the final group of antennas. 160 meter inverted V at 150', 80 meter slopers and high dipole about 125 feet up. 40 meter 3 el beam at 150', and a fixed quad at 70 feet. 20 meter 6 element on a 56 foot boom at 100', plus 4/4 at 105/50', 15 6/6 100/60', 3 el fixed south, 10 meters 6 el at 150 feet, 4/4 at 25/50'
The 5 towers were 150, 150, 110, 100 and 100 feet high. It was the kind of place all my friends would bring their wives, to show that their antenna plans were trivial.
We waged war with W3GPE (now W3MM- SK) just to try to win our township, in the Multi Multi class. We never cracked the upper echelon of big time multi multi operation, although we had a tremendous amount of fun trying.
This is KB3GJ, Mark, now a silent key. Mark was the chief 20 meter op, and did much of the inside work of maintaining the station.
W3WPG (SK), Hal Ritchey holed up at the shack for a few years, helping with operating, antenna building, and neighbor relations.
NQ4I, Rick, was invited to see how the FRC does contests, He left Arkansas, and became a world famous contester.
N3EC, now W3CC, Ed, our SSB mainstay. (maybe the only one of us that liked SSB)
KW3F (SK), Bob, low band op, fishing and guitar playing buddy
N2ATX, Chuck, KA3BLP, Bruce (sk), WA3WJV, Billy all in action.
K3VW (SK), Pete Carter, operated with us occasionally and did SSB Multi Singles with me for a few years after I relocated.
9Y4VU (SK), Frank chatting with K0VA (formerly KE6V and K3VA), Herb, and K3WJV, Billy.
Frank was attending classes in Philadelphia, and operated a contest with us. He was amazed at how SLOW the rates were.
During the first half of the 70's we used the Frankford Radio Club call, W3FRY. I purchased K3WW in the first wave of choose your own call, in the mid 70's.
In the early 80's events led to closing down the multi multi and retiring from big time contesting.
In 1984 I decided to operate contests from my new home . This is the same location I began operating from in 1959. My family and office were moved from a downtown location, about 1 mile, to my current location. I put up a TH6 at 55 feet and a 402BA above it at 65 feet, and 80 meter vertical with base loading for 160, and decided to make some points for the FRC, and not get so serious about contesting. Unfortunately I made the top 10 single op list in the CQWW CW contest the first time, after many years as a part of multi op efforts. This led to little refinements in the station, and with the creation of the Single Operator Assisted category, my activity level seemed to increase.
In the past decades I have been a member of the CQ-WW Contest Committee, helping with log checking chores, and more recently a member of the ARRL Contest Advisory Committee. I continue to make refinements to the station, mostly to make Single Op 2 Radio a possibility during contests. I still prefer the Single Op Assisted category and have continued to do OK as I contest into my 70's with over 60 years of continuous Amateur Radio activity.
