[CW] exclamation

Mon Feb 15 01:11:17 EST 2021

    What I am copying is from "Radio Theory and Operating" 3rd 
edition revised 1927 by Mary Texanna Loomis.  She has both the 
Continental code from the Department of Commerce chart and also 
American Morse, which was used for wireless to some degree at the 
time but was also used on the wire lines used to communicate with 
the coastal stations. I have somewhere a more complete set of 
characters but this will do for now.
    Note the Continental code list includes the two operating 
conventions .-... for wait and ...-. for understood.
    She also includes a discussion in detail of how communication 
takes place between a shore station and ship giving the use of 
the attention signal -.-.- and the end of message signal .-.-. (AR).
    Now the conventions used for American Morse as listed here:
Period ..--..
Colon  -.- .. (KO)
Colon Dash :- -.- .-.. (KX)
Semi-Colon  ... .. (SI)
Comma   .-.-
Interrogation   -..-.
Exclamation    ---.
Fraction Line   .  (Given as a single dit, perhaps a misprint, 
this is the letter E)
Dash   -.. .-..  (DX)
Hyphen  .... .-.. (HX)
Apostrophe  ..-. .-.. (QX)
Dollar Mark  ... .-.. (SX)
Pound Stirling  ..... .-.. (PX)
Shilling Mark   ..- -
Pence Mark   ..... (P)
Capital Letter .. . .-.. (CX)
Colon followed by Quotation -.- ..-. (KQ)
Cents  .. . (C)
Decimal Point -.. . . - (DOT)
Paragraph ----
Italics or Underline ..- .-.. (UX) Doesn't say if both  before 
and after.
Parenthesis  ..... .- (PA)
Brackets    -... .-.. (BX)
Quotation  ..-. -. (QN)
Quotation in Quotation  ..-. .-.. (QX)
Per Cent  long dash dot long dash (L E L)
    From memory the signals with X in them are from a set devised 
by Philips. While not part of the Philips code, which is an 
elaborate set of abbreviations, they were intended to provide a 
fairly complete set of punctuation and special signs for use in 
telegraph messages.
    I am quite sure this list can be found in several places. 
While the list of abbreviations for Continental code includes 
many of the same signs in general the combinations are different. 
One famous carry over, I think from the old Western Union code is 
30 for end of work, this is ...-. ----- (zero is a five unit dash 
in Morse) in Morse, which translates approximately to SK in 
Continental.
     The WU code is also the source of 73 for Best Regards and 
possibly 88 for Love and Kisses although I have not ever seen it 
listed.
     This book, BTW also has a copy of the Japanese Kana code for 
sending Japanese characters in Morse.
     I have long been fascinated by the codes and their 
evolution. I will see what else I can find.
     A note: I have another radio handbook published about a year 
after this one. There are several differences in the Q Code in 
the two. Evidently it evolved fairly rapidly at the time. Not 
surprising since tubes were replacing arc rapidly and damped 
waves had been banned some time before.

On 2/14/2021 2:52 PM, D.J.J. Ring, Jr. wrote:
> Send those along, Richard, what were they.
>
> Also any other contributions about Morse signals that "used to be" are welcome.
>
> 73
> DR
>
> On Sun, Feb 14, 2021 at 4:31 PM Richard Knoppow <1oldlens1 at ix.netcom.com> wrote:
>>      Maybe like the symbol in Philips code for capitals. Philips
>> was intended to send material like press so that the copy was
>> like an original type script.
>>
>> On 2/14/2021 11:42 AM, D.J.J. Ring, Jr. wrote:
>>> Thanks, Jude. As a word of explanation, Jude is my friend who
>>> is learning Morse, I'm not sure but I believe what he suggests
>>> is meant to be a joke, because he is a computer expert and is
>>> used to defining variables in programming.
>>>
>>>
>>> Jude, what is being suggested is adding a new character to
>>> International Morse code as has been recently done with the @
>>> symbol.
>>>
>>> It can and probably should be done with a proposal to the
>>> United Nations telecommunications working group though their
>>> International Telecommunications Union headquartered in Geneva,
>>> Switzerland, but first discussion and some agreement on what
>>> Morse symbol might be appropriate and useful.
>>>
>>> I made the suggestion that the old landline American Morse code
>>> had such a character and that I've heard that being used. I've
>>> also seen American Morse code symbol for $ used, it is SX  run
>>> together and sent as one character.
>>>
>>> Welcome to the group, Jude.
>>>
>>> 73
>>>
>>> DR
>>> N1EA
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On Sun, Feb 14, 2021, 1:09 PM Jude DaShiell <jdashiel at panix.com
>>> <mailto:jdashiel at panix.com>> wrote:
>>>
>>>      Maybe what may be useful to do as standard practice for
>>>      sending is to
>>>      transmit a symbols key the transmitter intends to use in
>>>      the message
>>>      containing characters other than the alphabet and then
>>>      transmit their
>>>      message.  If more than a single message happens between two
>>>      transmitters
>>>      in a single session the symbols key probably ought to go
>>>      out with the
>>>      first transmissions unless additional symbols would be used
>>>      in which case
>>>      a repeat of the symbols key with additional symbols would
>>>      likely help.
>>>      Such a practice may not be best used with dangerous weather
>>>      or combat
>>>      providing interference.  Documenting symbol keys from
>>>      transmitters in a
>>>      log for future messaging probably would help too.
>>>
>>>
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>>>      =30=
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>> --
>> Richard Knoppow
>> 1oldlens1 at ix.netcom.com
>> WB6KBL
>>
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>> =30=
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> =30=

-- 
Richard Knoppow
1oldlens1 at ix.netcom.com
WB6KBL