[CW] 486kHz Fessenden Commemorative Transmission Set for Christmas Eve

[D.J.J. Ring, Jr.]

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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