[CW] Recollections of W1BB Stew Perry of Winthrop, MA

Thu Apr 1 14:24:20 EDT 2021

Stew Perry, W1BB was a good friend of mine, he lived in Winthrop, MA which
is near Logan Airport (BOS).

He was a radio officer in the 1920s and then he graduated from
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge, MA and was a
outside salesman for Greybar Electric in Boston. He had his home in
Winthrop with it's 40 foot vertical, his two element phased inverted vees
at Deer Island Sewerage Treatment Plant in town,
and during the summer, he went to him farm up in Maine as W1BB/1. I guess
at the time the Deer Island location was W1BB/1 also due to FCC regulations
operating away from his home.

The 160M DXers gave Stew a book around 1977, we presented it to him at "The
Ship" restaurant in Lynfield, MA. Sadly this landmark is going away along
with the Hilltop Steak House cows.

He was very pleased to get it. It was like a FOC meeting with W1HZ, W1HX,
W1PL, N1EA, W1BB (all FOC members) and the W4 fellow who bound the letters
- about 500 of them - into a book. My father WA1DRR and mother also were
there because they loved "The Ship" - it had great fish.

In the late 1980s he was confined to nursing home care in
Melrose, MA the same city where I lived at that time and I used to visit
him.

He had throat cancer, lost his voice box, so he used a throat buzzer which
was very difficult to understand. He also had had a stroke.

I brought my McElroy 1939 bug to the nursing home and he had great
difficulty using it. The coordination just wasn't there. I also brought my
EK-430 keyer and used it's loud sidetone to fill the room.

But suddenly, he tried something different.

DE W1BB W1BB W1BB

Squeals of delight came from him - and myself too, for that matter.

He could "talk" again.

I went to sea and came home and would visit him, but my last trip around
1990 was too long to see W1BB again, he died in March of that year, before
I came home in June 1990.

But I'm sure that moment that his "voice" came alive pleased him, he told
me so.

I also got him smiling, I told him the story of the seaman who wanted
nothing more to do with the sea.

I told him the seaman put an oar over his shoulder and walked inland, and
kept going.

For hundreds of miles people would ask: "Hey, mister, what are you doing
with an oar over your shoulder?" He kept on walking.

Finally about 700 miles from the shore, he got a new question: "Hey,
mister, what's that funny looking thing you have over your shoulder?"

He went into town bought himself a lot of land and built himself his
retirement home.

He was never bothered with stories that start "This is no s4!t" anymore.

But the fairytales, they were a different thing, every day at four thirty,
a group of fathers and mothers came to his front porch and he'd tell them
the most interesting stories about all sorts of things. Just no sea stories.

BV OM Stu I miss your wonderful fist. Old signals never die,they only fade
away. = 73 de DR

Photos of Stu, W1BB, his antenna put up with the Town's permission at Deer
Island on the water tower just a half mile from his home, and a picture of
the restaurant where the bunch of us gave him a hand bound book of all the
160 meter operators - it must have had 600 signatures and messages. He was
delighted!

Pictures of Stew's
Stew Perry, W1BB was a good friend of mine, he lived in Winthrop, MA which
is near Logan Airport (BOS).

He was a radio officer in the 1920s and then he graduated from
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge, MA and was a
outside salesman for Greybar Electric in Boston. He had his home in
Winthrop with it's 40 foot vertical, his two element phased inverted vees
at Deer Island Sewerage Treatment Plant in town,
and during the summer, he went to him farm up in Maine as W1BB/1. I guess
at the time the Deer Island location was W1BB/1 also due to FCC regulations
operating away from his home.