Ham radio's golden age was the 1950s & early 1960s. It has
been in a steady decline ever since. The ARRL & the FCC have
facilitated the decline, for different reasons. If you practiced har
radio in the 50s-early 60s, then you know what I am saying is
correct.

OM

Your correct

From:

Anonymous poster. No-one accuses this person of being a coward even after
expressing strong biased opinion.

Welcome each and every new ham into the hobby with open arms --
after all, he's a brother (or she's a sister) who has taken the time
to study for and pass the written test, even if he doesn't have the
code.

Ah god...been there and done that. These were guys that were 25
year veterans of cb. They are smart asses...I tried to elmer
hem...they wouldnt listen.

Poster provides a reason, not to elmer CBers.

They get on the area 2 meter repeaters
and use their cb handles and 10 codes.

Language dielect differences. Nothing wrong with that. Nothing wrong with using
10-4 codes on voice modes, except that its using unnecessary codewords.

Most of them are extra class
to make matters worse.

So, they passed the code test. I thought anyone that passed the code test is
more respectful, better operators, and more skilled technically. Now you are
saying this is not true?


They have run all the older hams off the 2
meter band here in wv and east ky.

If all the older hams left, then only the younger ones remained?

But yes like a fool I welcomed
them into my home. Went to the classes and talked about ham radio
to them. But they are still just hardcore cbers. Its not like this
everywhere in the country but there is enough of this scattered
through the country to give most of us a sign of things to come.

Ham radio is a technical hobby, NOT a culture. You seem to forget that.
Otherwise you would not be referring to licenced amateurs as hardcore cbers.

No
ham radio will not die or come to an end because of these
types...but this is really what the code-nocode fuss is about.

Its about cbers. Really?

There's
thousands of us that have got a taste of these fools and dont want
any more of them. I dont want to be in the extra portion of any band
and hear 10-4. I dont want some idiot that just came off cb tuning
on top of me and whistling into his mic...but its happening and has
been for the last 2 years since the code was dropped to 5wpm.

I don't want to hear dots and dashes. I'd much rather hear conversation.

Now you can scream about elmering and
all that...but like i said i tried...and these fools are unelmerable.

Speak normal language like most people. Its not "elmering", its teaching.

And how are you going to attract people with technical interests to the hobby?
The people with EE degrees will realize, by your comparison to cbers, that hams
like code and dislike technically inclined people. And one with an EE degree is
likely to be insulted by what you are saying, and not want to join the hobby.

When they looked at my full wave loop they laughed and said their
cb antennas would work better. One looked at my 2 element 5
band quad at 65 feet and said his moonraker was a better antenna.

I doubt that. You probably made that up. Also, you probably made up the story
about how people tuning on top of you increased after the code speed was
dropped.

Soon
we'll all have to pay the price for most of you wanting to do away
with the code.

No faith in the individual. What are you, a communist?

Thats it in a nutshell.

From a nut.

"OM" wrote:

Ham radio's golden age was the 1950s & early 1960s. It has
been in a steady decline ever since. The ARRL & the FCC have
facilitated the decline, for different reasons. If you practiced har
radio in the 50s-early 60s, then you know what I am saying is
correct.


What a bunch of depressing malcontents in this newsgroup. I just read
through this newsgroup and if someone isn't crying about the code test,
someone else is crying about the written tests. Thrown into all this is
endless gripes about ARRL and the FCC. Now, we have someone talking about
the "golden" past like we can all just snap our fingers and go back to that
supposedly perfect time.

Ham radio is, and will always be, just what you make of it, people. If you
choose to focus on the worst aspects of anything, that's all you're going to
see. However, I suspect there is as many good things about ham radio today,
and as many good people in ham radio today, as there was during any other
time period. Regardless, this today is all we have. Either make the best of
it or perhaps you should find another hobby.


Dwight Stewart (W5NET)

http://www.qsl.net/w5net/

In article et, "Dwight
Stewart" writes:

Now, we have someone talking about
the "golden" past like we can all just snap our fingers and go back to that
supposedly perfect time.

1950s & early 1960s, huh? Well, that was a time when surplus was plentiful and
cheap, Generals and Conditionals had full privileges, homebrewing was a lot
more common and there was reportedly a lot less nonsense on the bands.
Anti-antenna CC&Rs were unknown and there was little competition from other
electronic avocations.

However, there was a dark side back then:

- the new medium of television brought with it the spectre of TVI. Evn the
cleanest rigs often tore up the neighbor's reception something awful, due to
fundamental overload or audio rectification. Many sets back then had terrible
design flaws like 21 MHz IF strips and inadequate shielding. And just try
telling your irate neighbor that his new $500 marvel was not technically
perfect...

- Manufactured ham equipment was big, heavy, and expensive. High powered stuff
even more so. Let's not even get into the vagaries of tuning up and the damage
you could do if you messed up the procedure. The prices in the old mags and
catalogs look cheap until you factor inflation. Many folks homebrewed or
converted surplus out of sheer necessity. $1000 would buy a nice station back
then, when a $5000 annual income was solidly middle class. Figure 20% of your
annual gross salary today...

- At the beginning of that "golden" time, "phone" usually meant "AM". (There
was some SSB as early as 1933, and lots more after WW2, but AM was still king
for a while). AM meant bands full of 6-8 kHz wide signals and heterodynes. AM
was simple to implement but not inexpensive even at moderate power due to the
modulation power needed. At end of that period, SSB had pretty much taken over
HF 'phone. In between, a lot of nastiness had flowed back and forth over which
mode was "better".

- The only data mode hams could use was 60 wpm Baudot RTTY, using mechanical
teleprinters that were far too expensive for most hams to buy new. MARS and
surplus were the usual sources, and once the machine was obtained you needed to
build a TU and other interface gear.

- No repeaters. No personal computers. No WARC bands. No legal phone patching.
No VE sessions. No true transceivers until the late '50s. No vanity calls for
99% of hams.

- There were only 100,000 US hams at the beginning of that time and 250,000 at
the end.

And yet, hams had a lot of fun.

Ham radio is, and will always be, just what you make of it, people. If you
choose to focus on the worst aspects of anything, that's all you're going to
see. However, I suspect there is as many good things about ham radio today,
and as many good people in ham radio today, as there was during any other
time period. Regardless, this today is all we have. Either make the best of
it or perhaps you should find another hobby.

WELL SAID!

I'll add this:

One of the great strengths of amateur radio is that it offers a very wide range
of activities to a wide range of people. And one of the great weaknesses of
amateur radio is that it offers a very wide range of activities to a wide range
of people.

73 de Jim, N2EY

"Brian Kelly" wrote in message
om...
Mike Coslo wrote in message
...
Erich Voobner wrote:



Per qrz.com, N2EY d.o.b. April 24, 1954
N2EY, another in a long line of Bull****ters, who
"personally" experienced ham radio in the1950s.
One thing that has never changed in ham radio, the
hobby has no shortage of bull****ters and wannabes.

So he had to be a ham at that time to know what hams were using?
An interest in history could fit the bill here. He's only a couple
months older than me, and I also knew a lot of what he posted. And I
wasn't a Ham until 1999.

I *was* all over the bands in the early/mid '50s and I'm here to tell
all you newbies what this "Golden Age" BS was actually like in
comparison to the ham radio we have today in one quick broad-brush
capsulization: If I had turn the clock back and "do" ham radio like we
had in those days my ticket would have landed in the dumpster three
decades ago.

'Twas the Medieval Age of radio, a one notch improvement beyond the
Dark Age of radio.


- Mike KB3EIA -

w3rv

Heh heh...my grampaw used to be one of those folks who lived in
yesteryears--all rosey and wonderful. Yep, life sure was a lot better back
then, no highways, no good medical knowledge, etc. And, just as you Brian,
I'm sure there's many who feel just like you do. I feel that way just
thinking about it

Kim W5TIT

(Brian Kelly) wrote in message . com...
Mike Coslo wrote in message ...
Erich Voobner wrote:



Per qrz.com, N2EY d.o.b. April 24, 1954
N2EY, another in a long line of Bull****ters, who
"personally" experienced ham radio in the1950s.
One thing that has never changed in ham radio, the
hobby has no shortage of bull****ters and wannabes.

So he had to be a ham at that time to know what hams were using?
An interest in history could fit the bill here. He's only a couple
months older than me, and I also knew a lot of what he posted. And I
wasn't a Ham until 1999.

I *was* all over the bands in the early/mid '50s and I'm here to tell
all you newbies what this "Golden Age" BS was actually like in
comparison to the ham radio we have today in one quick broad-brush
capsulization: If I had turn the clock back and "do" ham radio like we
had in those days my ticket would have landed in the dumpster three
decades ago.

Brian, I hadn't expected you to say something like that. I've heard
Dick comment on being able (or having no choice but) to copy 7 QSOs
simultaneously because of the selectivity of those old rigs.

I wish there had been that much activity when I was willing to go thru
the ordeal.

73, Brian

(Brian) wrote in message . com...
(Brian Kelly) wrote in message . com...
Mike Coslo wrote in message ...
Erich Voobner wrote:



Per qrz.com, N2EY d.o.b. April 24, 1954
N2EY, another in a long line of Bull****ters, who
"personally" experienced ham radio in the1950s.
One thing that has never changed in ham radio, the
hobby has no shortage of bull****ters and wannabes.

So he had to be a ham at that time to know what hams were using?
An interest in history could fit the bill here. He's only a couple
months older than me, and I also knew a lot of what he posted. And I
wasn't a Ham until 1999.

I *was* all over the bands in the early/mid '50s and I'm here to tell
all you newbies what this "Golden Age" BS was actually like in
comparison to the ham radio we have today in one quick broad-brush
capsulization: If I had turn the clock back and "do" ham radio like we
had in those days my ticket would have landed in the dumpster three
decades ago.

Brian, I hadn't expected you to say something like that. I've heard
Dick comment on being able (or having no choice but) to copy 7 QSOs
simultaneously because of the selectivity of those old rigs.

Believe it. The top gun rcvrs in those days with even half decent
selectivity were built by Collins and cost 7-8 weeks worth of an
average engineer's entire paychecks. Today much better rcvrs are
available for 10-12 *days* worth of his/her paychecks. Radio kids had
it really miserable, it took me a whole summer to earn enough money to
buy a monumental crapper S-40B rcvr from Sears. Seven QSOs at a time?
No problem! Had the same selectivity characteristics as one of today's
$10-20 throwaway pocket AM/FM broadcast rcvrs. Maybe worse. Ya could
hear a dozen or so stations when the band was really cooking, half
were real signals and the other half were images & intermod products.
Then came the drift . . "Golden Days" my ass . . !


I wish there had been that much activity when I was willing to go thru
the ordeal.

The Novice bands of those days are about the only aspect of 'wayback
radio I wish we still had.


73, Brian

w3rv

"Brian Kelly" wrote in message
om...



Believe it. The top gun rcvrs in those days with even half decent
selectivity were built by Collins and cost 7-8 weeks worth of an
average engineer's entire paychecks. Today much better rcvrs are
available for 10-12 *days* worth of his/her paychecks. Radio kids had
it really miserable, it took me a whole summer to earn enough money to
buy a monumental crapper S-40B rcvr from Sears. Seven QSOs at a time?
No problem! Had the same selectivity characteristics as one of today's
$10-20 throwaway pocket AM/FM broadcast rcvrs. Maybe worse. Ya could
hear a dozen or so stations when the band was really cooking, half
were real signals and the other half were images & intermod products.
Then came the drift . . "Golden Days" my ass . . !



w3rv

But, I'll bet, if you think about it.....it made you a better operator. It
was a SKILL you HAD TO LEARN in order to StAY ON THE AIR? Think about it.

Dan/W4NTI

In article , Mike Coslo
writes:

N2EY wrote:
In article et, "Dwight
Stewart" writes:


Now, we have someone talking about
the "golden" past like we can all just snap our fingers and go back to that
supposedly perfect time.


1950s & early 1960s, huh? Well, that was a time when surplus was plentiful
and
cheap, Generals and Conditionals had full privileges, homebrewing was a lot
more common and there was reportedly a lot less nonsense on the bands.
Anti-antenna CC&Rs were unknown and there was little competition from other
electronic avocations.

However, there was a dark side back then:

How about this for a reason, Jim?

I take it you mean "why some folks call it a golden age"...

Many of the people complaining about
how good it used to be have been hams for a long time.

I've got 36 years next month.

Some of the
youthful enthusiasm has gone away, and now they are perhaps a little
bored with it.

Not me. I'm looking forward to the next 36 years.

Plus the creeping crankies start to set in, and you have
a ripe field for "It ain't as good as it used to be" syndrome to set in.

I think *most* humans have a built-in memory mechanism that tends to remember
the good things more than the bad ones. (Otherwise most women would never have
a second child!) Also, we know how the past turned out, while we don't know how
the future will. So there's a natural tendency to pretty up the past.

That doesn't mean that all eras are the same. Maybe it really WAS a "golden
age". Certainly some things in ham radio were better back then. And some things
are better now. We can learn a lot from those times. The good things can be
preserved and the bad things improved.

Nothing is ever as good as it used to be! And never was.

"The good old days weren't always good
Tomorrow's not as bad as it seems" - Billy Joel

"And the seasons, they go round and round
And the painted ponies go up and down
We're captive on the carousel of time
We can't return, we can only look
Behind to to where we came
And go round and round and round in the Circle Game" - Joni Mitchell



73 de Jim, N2EY

In article . net, "Dan/W4NTI"
w4nti@get rid of this mindspring.com writes:

But, I'll bet, if you think about it.....it made you a better operator. It
was a SKILL you HAD TO LEARN in order to StAY ON THE AIR? Think about it.

'zactly. No other option. The Novice was not supposed to be a permanent
license. That's why it had so few privileges and was so focused,

And the old Novice had another feature - it was a one-time one year license
until 1967, when it became two years. Which meant that you either upgraded
before the license ran out or you were off the air. The Novice year/2 years was
a big learning time. Lotta incentive!

In fact, one of the reasons FCC gave us incentive licensing was that they
perceived a drop off in learning after the Novice year.

Most sensible newbies in those times had at least a receiver and antenna set up
and working before they went for the Novice exam. They'd spent serious time
listening to hams on the air before ever taking a test. They knew which bands
were best at various times of day and year simply from observation. They
developed a lot of operating skills and knowledge of operating practices before
ever getting a transmitter.

When the Novice became 5 year renewable, that incentive went away.

We're not going to get the mfrs. to stop making IC-706s and start making S-40s,
so what's the solution?

73 de Jim, N2EY