[CW] Charts of Radio Morse and American Wire Morse.

[Donald Chester via CW]

There used to be, and maybe still is if any members are still kicking, a
group of  hams who practised American landline Morse in a net on 80m.
Probably old time railway operators. As I recall, they ID'ed in
International Morse, but carried on their net in American Morse.

Johnny Johnston, who had retired from the FCC and who is well known by the
AM phone community as the guy who instigated a steady stream of RM proposals
during his 25-year tenure that would have severely  restricted amateur AM or
eliminated it altogether, claimed in an article he wrote that American Morse
is illegal to use on the ham bands because, according to the Part 97 rules,
CW is defined as "on and off keying, using International Morse code". He
claimed it was illegal to transmit American Morse because it does not fit
the FCC's definition of CW.

The president of a telegrapher-hobbyist club contacted the FCC regarding the
article. They basically told him to ignore that guy because he no longer
works for the FCC and no longer has any say over what is legal on the ham
bands.  I talked to one of the  guys in the club at Dayton and exchanged
e-mails with another member and that's what they told me. Pretty  sad... the
guy tried his best to screw over a group of hams while he was at the FCC,
and once he retired, was still at it, trying to screw over another group of
hams.

There is enough similarity between the codes that one probably  could follow
the gist of the conversation if one knew only the other code, kind of like
someone who speaks Spanish  can get the gist of a conversation in Italian
and vice versa.  I was surprised how easily I could understand regular
International Morse when transmitted to an old fashioned land-line sounder
during a demonstration. I don't know if I could decipher much of a message
in American Morse transmitted to a sounder, though.


73,
Don k4kyv



-----Original Message-----

What's the deal about American morse?

Apparently nobody uses it. Is it just being remembered from the railroad
days for posterity or some thing?


Best regards - Brian Carling


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