On Mon, 11 Jan 2016, Jim GM4DHJ ... wrote:


wrote in message
...
In rec.radio.amateur.equipment gareth wrote:
"highlandham" wrote in message
...

In ham radio , for most licensees ,the prime focus is on operating

Then they are indistinguishable from CBers


That is a fact and IMHO there is no reason to keep moaning about it.

There is every reason to speak out against the dumbing down of a proud
technical pursuit

I take it obtaining an amateur radio license is your only notable
accomplishment in life which would explain why you are such a self
rightous ass hole.

Here's a news flash for you:

Children were passing the tests over 50 years ago when they were much
more difficult.

Passing such tests shows nothing more than you are willing to put forth
the effort to learn a subject; it does NOT make you any better than
anyone else.


Yes you used to see all the precocious little brats in QST...thank god in
the UK it used to be 14 years old before you could get a Licence...

When I first learned about amateur radio, I was eight or nine. Something
about it appealed to me. But when I looked into it, you had to be fifteen
or older here in Canada. A long way off.

I have no idea whether I could have passed at that age, there was a slow
period but I know in the summer of 1970, I went through all the
"electronic" books (more like electrical) in the children's section of the
library and soon had access to the adult library.

I found the hobby electronic magazines in January of 1971, 45 years ago,
and had an "associate" membership in the ARRL (you could only be a full
member if you were licensed, and the only way to get QST was by becoming
am member) in April of 1971. That's when I started reading as much about
electronics and radio as I could. I didnt' have to worry about taking a
test since that was years in the future.

Then in December of 1971, a tiny piece of filler in the newspaper. They
were changing the rules, you no longer had to be fifteen to get the
license.

I fiddled around to find a local amateur radio club, no internet back then
to find it easily, and joined the code & theory class they held each year
in mid-Febrary, when it had started in October. The kid sitting next to
me said "you'll never pass, you came in too late".

It turned out the rules didnt' change till the end of April 1972. I took
the test the first chance I could, about mid-May, and passed everything
but the code receiving (I didn't have a receiver good enough, I'd bought a
junky Hallicrafters transistorized shortwave receiver in the summer of
1971, spending all my accumulated birthday money, thinking I could listen
to shortwave broadcasts while waiting to get old enough to take the test).
The kid sitting next to me didn't pass, took the code & theory class a
second time, i think he eventually passed but can't remember.

I went down in mid-June, took the code receiving test again, and passed.
So I was 12 and a half when I passed, probably the youngest ham in Canada
at the time, but I didn't get my picture in the paper. The first time I
was on the air, it took a while for the license to arrive, it was just
after the Rolling Stone's equipment truck blew up here.

My story wasn't exceptional, lots of people got their ham licenses early
on. I'm not sure how old Howard Amstrong was, but he may have even played
with radio before there was an actual ham license.

I suspect a difference to watch is whether the kid shows an interest in
the hobby, or are doing it because someone in their family is a ham and
steers them, or those places in the US where they teach amateur radio to a
class of elementary school kids; in both cases they can pass the test
fine, but may not have the interest in the hobby to make much of it.

I may not be a good ham, but amateur radio was terribly influential in my
life, going from a 12 year old into the adult world, reading books and
magazines "beyond my age", learning about learning. I made my first
subway trip by myself to get to the parts store, ended up walking there
not long after so I've always walked most places. It gave me a vantage
point away from my "peers". All that I am comes from amateur radio. It
might have come from something else, I was already interested in science
before I found out about ham radio, but it was amateur radio that did it
in the end.

It's a weird thing pursuing the family tree and discovering a distant
relative with the same great, great, great grandparents who also happens
to be a ham.

Michael