{"id":1030,"date":"2014-03-03T07:56:52","date_gmt":"2014-03-03T12:56:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wa2bsw.com\/?page_id=1030"},"modified":"2019-11-16T06:29:21","modified_gmt":"2019-11-16T11:29:21","slug":"call-sign-history","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/wa2bsw.com\/?page_id=1030","title":{"rendered":"My call sign and Ham Radio history"},"content":{"rendered":"

Call Sign History –<\/strong><\/p>\n

After receiving my vanity call in early March 2012, I became interested in its history.\u00a0 An article in the May 1994 issue of QST indicates that K call signs were first introduced in 1947 for the 9th call area only.\u00a0 It appears from the same article that K calls were issued in other call areas in the mid 1950. \u00a0 (I did not miss by much in receiving a KN call for my Novice license).<\/p>\n

The FCC web site showed the previous holder of the call was William F. Wiebe (Palm Beach, Fla). \u00a0 The Call Book information I have indicates that the call was assigned to him from some time in 1976 until I obtained it in 2012.\u00a0 Prior to that Robert Pierce (Jacksonville, Fla) held the call from 1968 until 1974 or 1975.\u00a0 So far I can not see that the call was assigned prior to 1968.<\/p>\n

More research to follow.<\/p>\n

Notes:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. As part of Incentive Licensing on or after November 22, 1967 a two letter call could be requested if the ham held a US license for at least 25 years and holds an Extra Class.\u00a0 No special combination of letter were offered.<\/li>\n
  2. Docket 20092 effective July 1, 1976 allowed any Extra Class licensee to request a specific 1X2 call.<\/li>\n
  3. The Call Book information was found on archive.org<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    My Ham Radio history –<\/strong><\/p>\n

    One day in late 1957 or early 1958 a friend and I came up with the idea to get into Ham Radio.\u00a0 To this day I do not know how this came into our heads, but off we went to get our tickets.\u00a0 My friend moved away before we got licensed and shortly thereafter we lost track of each other.\u00a0 In the late 1950’s to a 13 year old kid 50 miles and a state away might as well be on the moon.\u00a0 My first license, Novice class, was issued on September 2, 1958 (copy below).\u00a0\u00a0 Unlike most hams you read about on the web, my Novice year was a bust.\u00a0 For some unknown reason I stuck with it and passed my Technician\u00a0 class test (finally).\u00a0 That was when I made contact with an Elmer (a ham who worked with my father).\u00a0 He was Jack – K2IUK.\u00a0 I built a six meter crystal controlled transmitter and Jack made it work. Add a modulator he lent me and a converter another friend of my father’s built and six meter AM became my home for the next year plus.\u00a0 After meeting a newly minted novice with a very nice Eico 720 transmitter I experienced the success on the Novice HF CW bands that I had missed.\u00a0 That was all it took for me to study and make the trip to 641 Washington Street New York City to take my General test.\u00a0 Passed on the first try (a new concept).\u00a0 Back in those days a General ticket gave you access to all Amateur Radio frequencies.\u00a0 (I will not get on a soapbox about “incentive” licensing and the about face of today.)\u00a0 In the mid 1970’s after acquiring my first modern SSB equipment I spent most of my time on phone.\u00a0 Therefore, in February 1980 I upgraded to the Advance Class license to get some of my old phone operating privileges back.\u00a0 Passing on the first time was a thing of the past.\u00a0 In fact I took the test in New York City and Chicago before a return trip to New York yielded a passing grade.\u00a0 Revisiting CW and being bitten my the DX bug I decided to upgrade to extra to get the low end of 40 and 20 Meters back.\u00a0 Determined to make only one trip to the test site (easier trip with the VE Program),\u00a0 I studied like crazy.\u00a0 On 26 February 2006, I took and passed my Extra Class test (okay, studying worked as I passed on the first try and I aced it!)<\/p>\n

    \"\"<\/a>

    My first Amateur Radio license. The Novice class license had a one year nonrenewable term.<\/span><\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Call Sign History – After receiving my vanity call in early March 2012, I became interested in its history.\u00a0 An article in the May 1994 issue of QST indicates that K call signs were first introduced in 1947 for the 9th call area only.\u00a0 It appears from the same article that K calls were issued\u2026 Continue Reading ‘My call sign and Ham Radio history’<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":2,"menu_order":8,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-1030","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wa2bsw.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1030","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wa2bsw.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wa2bsw.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wa2bsw.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wa2bsw.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1030"}],"version-history":[{"count":50,"href":"https:\/\/wa2bsw.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1030\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2399,"href":"https:\/\/wa2bsw.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1030\/revisions\/2399"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wa2bsw.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/2"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wa2bsw.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1030"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}