[Boatanchors] Re: GB> Folksy MARS

[Ray Friess]

Yea... MARS was fantastic back then.  Still fairly good today... but like the
hams National Traffic System it suffers from lack of written traffic.  who
wants to
send a MARSGRAM when you can get on the internet even from a battle zone
and send a message home?
     Still lots of phone patching going on though... I spend a few minutes
every night listening to the phone patch nets....   the fliers getting a phone
patch home or to the base while up in the skies....



Smith wrote:

>  "It is no
> longer a folksy organizination with Barry Goldwater running phone patches
> from Vietnam"
>
> Well it may have been "folksy" but the astronomical  amount of phone
> patches accomplished by MARS personnel during the Viet Nam era was one heck
> of an accomplishment, often at much expense of the MARS members due to the
> long distance phone bills. Barry Goldwater's station manned by volunteers
> and very rarely by Barry received a lot of publicity but  only handle a
> portion of the traffic.  Having been on the Viet Nam user end I very much
> appreciated the "folksy" phone patches and many a call relieved me from
> worrying about family situations at home . .  . I was then able to command
> and fly safer missions. My personal observations of radio procedures by
> these MARS personnel resulted in my overall grade of A plus.
>
> 73 Breck K4CHE