[600MRG] 486kHz Fessenden Commemorative Transmission Set for Christmas Eve

[Ralph Wallio, W0RPK]

From: http://www.arrl.org/arrlletter?issue=2018-12-20

Fessenden Commemorative Transmission Set for Christmas Eve

As he's done in years past, Brian Justin, WA1ZMS, of Forest, Virginia, 
will commemorate what may have been the first radio broadcast to include 
speech and music by experimenter Reginald Fessenden on Christmas Eve 
1906. Justin will fire up his vintage-style transmitter operating on 486 
kHz under Experimental license WI2XLQ to mark the 112th anniversary of 
Fessenden's accomplishment. Justin will begin his transmission on 
December 24 at 1700 UTC and continue until December 26 at 1659 UTC.

Historic accounts say Fessenden played the violin -- or a recording of 
violin music -- and read a brief Bible verse, astounding radio 
experimenters and shipboard operators who heard the broadcast. For his 
transmitter in 1906, Fessenden used an ac alternator modulated by 
placing carbon microphones in series with the antenna feed line.

Justin's homebuilt station is slightly more modern, based on a 1921 
vacuum-tube master oscillator power amplifier (MOPA) design, using a 
UV-202 tube. The transmitter employs Heising AM modulation, developed by 
Raymond Heising during World War I.

Send listener reports directly to Brian Justin, WA1ZMS.


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