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#11
February 6th 04, 07:10 PM
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Dave Heil wrote in message ...
Brian Kelly wrote: (N2EY) wrote in message . com... Her folks shepherded her into ham radio beacause ham radio is a great way for kids to learn geography?? Not necessarily, Brian, but studying for an amateur ticket gets kids fired up about learning. I can certainly see Jim's point about kids becoming interested in geography, the sciences and math. I dunno, I guess but experiences, perceptions and observations vary all over the lot when it comes to educating kids. Never mind opinions on the subject. I'll cite my own case. As were all four of my parent's kids I was a pretty early and prolific reader. Implanting the joy of reading was the big gift our parents bestowed on us and they both worked at it. Hard. Once that bug was firmly installed we were pretty much left alone to find our own paths without much if any "hands-on participation" in our interests on their parts. To wit: Geography was one of my hot buttons going way back long before I had the first clue about ham radio. Usta love to cruise the maps which came with National Geo. Any maps. Still do. When I finally bumped into ham radio and disovered that hams could actually communicate with people in those far off places I'd read about my course was set: I absolutely was gonna become a ham so I could go dxing. I did and I still do. It was my interest in geography which led me to ham radio. I don't give ham radio any credit at all for my interest in science. If I hadn't already had an interest in science I wouldn't have developed an interest in ham radio to start with. I was into building electric motors before I got interested in ham radio for instance. And in geology, bugs and weather science. I didn't have any interest at all in math as such until I was halfway thru engineering school with a General and it finally dawned on me that I was actually sort of enjoying the stuff. It didn't work toward interesting me in geometry though. I was caught reading QST hidden within my open geometry book. Geometry was no sweat here but I got tossed outta 10th grade English class twice for laying out equipment panels at the back of the class. Then the flaming fairy teach caught Sally Leinhauser and I playing footsie. Such "activities" apparently really annoy fairies. No problem, life coulda been a *helluva* lot worse than sitting out in the hallway with Sally. During the same year I built an AM BC rcvr which used five of the tiny AG-1 flashbulb envelope subminiature tubes and stuffed the whole thing into a small Band-Aid can which I carried in my shirt pocket. Walkman Numero Uno. I went into biology class one day and strung the wire antenna to an overhead lamp fixture, put on the earplug "speaker" and started tuning around. The teacher, good 'ole Floyd Neff finally noticed the antenna and stormed to the back of the room, "What are you doing, what is that thing?" I cupped my ear, "Uh, it's my hearing aid, could you speak up a bit please?" Tossed outta class again. You brought back a lot of hilarious memories of "electronerd educations" gone awry David. Gawd we had fun . . ! For the first few weeks of my interest, my dad actively discouraged me with talk of amateur radio being a passing fad for me. He had visions of mounds of equipment gathering dust in a closet. He was right, I've seen it happen . . ! My mother encouraged me and was able to convince my father that some of the meager family income should be spent on a transmitter for me if I earned the money for the receiver from my paper route. You got lucky, I got NOTTING in the way of economic support for diddling with radios despite the volume of coin my parents had. Their policy was that if some pursuit or another was important enough to their kids we could bloody well work out how to pay for it on our own or drop it. With the notable exception of cheerfully paying the expenses related to Boy Scouting. I *really* needed radio gear so I had a couple paper routes, peddled magazine subsciptions, painted house numbers on curbs in December, etc. Got the equipment and some early lessons on how much work hot buttons can actually cost. My dad had and has no technical abilities whatever. My mother was deathly afraid of electricity and wouldn't even clean my ham shack. She just knew that lightning was going to enter the house via my antennas. Both parents saw value in amateur radio as a wholesome activity, one which would nurture an interest in science and possibly lead to a career in electronics. Once more we all obviously came from very different directions to a sort of convergence here. My Dad excused himself from an orphanage at age 14 and became an apprentice tool and die maker. Eventually he moved on into the U of P med school research labs as a creative guru in the electrical instrumentation, glass-blowing and mechanical shops. Mom became a secretary-turned-lab-assistant in the same research facility where they met in 1933 or so and here I is. Mom had a much older civil engineering student brother who "fiddled with radios all night" and who might have been an early ham. He passed away before he graduated so I'll never know if he was a ham or not. Bottom line here being that when I got into ham radio and hung wires all over the yard none of it particularly attracted much parental attention. At dinner one night I puffily announced that I'd worked Africa for the first time the night before, a ZS6 on 80 CW. "That's nice dear. Did you clean your bedroom yet?" Career guidance via ham radio? Ha! As if. Just after WW2 they put together the family tool and die works in which all four of their offspring were raised. So of course we all became gearheads, even the girl knows wrenches. Two mechanical engineers, another tool and die maker (turned statistician and programmer), the girl got into computer programming about the time the first punch card decks showed up. What I have gotten out of ham radio as it relates to my career is a *much* better grip on EE sorts of things than the average ME has. Has proven to be a very big asset on many occasions. I raised my three daughters pretty much the way I was raised and none of 'em are slouches in their various professional technical fields. I know Janie. Her father was Jesse Bieberman W3KT who is still a legend. Honer Roll top-ender for decades, phone and cw dx contester, 25wpm with a straight key for 48 straight. Vice Director of the Atlantic Division for decades and one of the most powerful voices in Newington in those days. Ran the W3 buro single-handed also for decades. ...and ran the W3KT outgoing QSL forwarding service for a number of years. I forgot all about that, tnx. Speaking of QSL card handling Joe Arcure W3HNK is in this neighborhood, I gotta look him up. Dave K8MN Brian w3rv |
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