[CW] CW and attraction to ham radio

[Ken Brown]

Hi all,

This is my first post to the CW reflector. I am 47 years old and operate 
almost exclusively HF CW. When I first was attracted to ham radio I 
wanted to operate phone. I found demonstrations of CW operation 
completely uninteresting. I remember my dad taking me to visit a ham who 
had some kind of beam (maybe it was a quad) on a rotor above his shack. 
I thought that rotating beam was really cool! The ham worked a few 
Russians or Europeans on CW and it did not do anything for me. He also 
had an AM rig, which I think he fired up, but maybe did not manage to 
make a QSO with. Still the idea of communicating over long distances 
using invisible waves and all that neat equipment was really attractive. 
Having to learn the Morse code to get a license seemed like an annoying, 
yet surmountable, hurdle. When I was around 8 or 10 years old I was 
studing to learn Morse code, but for whatever reason just didn't stick 
to it enough to ever take the test. I was probably proficient enough to 
pass a ten question type of code test, but in those days you had to 
really be able to copy and get a solid minute out of five... My uncle 
was an electronic technician who decided to go into the two-way radio 
business. He worked on VHF & UHF stuff and CB too. I remember this from 
when I was about 10 or 12 years old. He talked (phone with a mic) to 
people on the CB. In these days you were only supposed to talk to other 
units under the same license. It was okay to get a radio check from 
someone else, but chit chat was supposed to be kept to a minimum. CB was 
absolutely for home and small business and NOT for hobby use. Still I 
thought it was really neat. Eventually my dad got a used CB from my 
uncle, and we built a groundplane out of EMT tubing and guy wire. My dad 
also got me an old BC-779 Super-Pro. I talked on the CB a few times, but 
not much. I spent hours with the Super-Pro listening to all the weird 
signals, playing with all the controls. Sometimes I'd listen to the AM 
SWBC stations, sometimes I'd just try to see how weird a noise I could 
get out of the receiver. I seldom listened to any CW, and when I did I 
wasn't really interested in trying to decode it, or learning how to do 
so. Still I really thought radio was way cool. I loved to look at any 
book in the library about radio. Mostly I like to look at the 
transmitter and receiver construction projects in the ARRL Handbooks. 
Eventually I met a kid in seventh grade whose dad was a ham. We decided 
to study together and his dad or some other ham would be able to give us 
the novice exam. Finally in 1970 I took may Novice exam and passed the 
first try. That summer when I was 13 I finally received the license from 
the FCC. I had built a two tube TX from the 1968 Handbook and with the 
Super-Pro I was on the air on 40 meter CW. I had a lot of fun, and 
studied and practiced to get my General, so I could get on fone. In 
about 71 or 72 I got my general, bought a used SB-401 and got on fone. I 
forgot about CW. I didn't plug a key into a transmitter again until 
about 1985. I had a lot of fun on HF SSB, but of course it got boring. I 
almost let my license lapse. Then when I got interested again I decided 
that I really wanted to learn to operate CW. I don't know why I changed, 
but I guess it was because I missed radio, but was bored with phone. 
.... So what is the point? The CW requirement did not keep me from being 
interested in ham radio. There is already an HF band for poeple who 
don't want to put in the effort to learn CW. The present CW requirement 
is such a joke anyway. ANYBODY can pass it. These people that claim that 
some people are just incapable are full of (expletive deleted)! I know 
people who have passed the 5 WPM by writing down the dits and dahs and 
then translating. Without CW it's just CB. Ham radio IS CW.

Sorry about the rant, I hope I'm not expelled from the reflector.

DE N6KB