weatherall wrote:
A couple months ago, Art Bell talked about the solar maximum (of cycle
19) in the late 1950s when the sunspot count was very high. He said
shortwave reception was incredible then, and he was easily receiving
hams from around the world. Were any of you listening to shortwave or
hams at that time? I want to know more about what it was like.

Well, the best as its ever been in my lifetime. Just got my General
class ham ticket around '59 or '60, so I was able to use my dad's ham
station-a Heath Apache and Mohawk with a 60 foot tower and a tri-band beam.

Working DX was almost too easy... the bands were spectacular, open
almost 24 hours a day, even 10 meters. Just for an experiment, I
remember turning down the transmit power to around ten watts on 20
meters, and working KC6PE (Ponape Island) on the first call...