[Elecraft] New Mystery: Copying groups vs plain language text (Rather OT)

[Fred Jensen]

I guess my memory is better than I thought. In '56, I sat for the 2T 
accidentally ... 16, new driver, terrified driving to downtown Los 
Angeles, and got there in the AM as he was setting up for the 2T.  He 
[roughish sort of guy, voice like a growl, cigar, and no fooling, green 
eye shade] gave me an app, said,  "Fill it out, if you pass the code you 
get credit for the Extra this afternoon."  I passed with 5 minutes of 
correct copy on both groups and plain text. He gave me the written exam, 
I told him I was only 16, birth date was on the app.  He removed the 
cigar, looked right at me and said, "Son, sit down and answer the damn 
questions."  So I did, and passed ... exactly.  There were a couple or 
three "Colpitts Questions."  Passed the Extra that afternoon, same guy, 
same cigar, same growl.

The 2T and Extra were both pencil/paper copy and J-28 screwed to the 
desk with ungodly wide spacing ... not to be adjusted by examinees. 
[:-)  Although I already had credit for the code, I wrote it anyway, and 
it was all plain text.  I really don't know where the urban legend of 
groups for the Extra came from but lots of folk think it was a 
requirement.  Used my 2T for 10 mo while a HS senior as the "Station 
Kid" at a coastal marine station, it expired while I was in college.  
Kept the 1P, it became a lifetime GROL which is somewhere around here.  
I still wonder why the groups were slower than plaintext, they were a 
lot easier for me.

73,
Fred ["Skip"] K6DGW
Sparks NV DM09dn
Washoe County

On 4/30/2020 5:50 PM, Mike Morrow wrote:
> Fred,
>
> The Radiotelegraph Second Class license required send and receive at 20 wpm Plain Language and 16 wpm Code Groups with no errors for one minute during the five minute test.  The First Class license had the same written elements (1, 2, 5, 6) as the Second Class license but the Morse test was 25 wpm Plain Language and 20 wpm Code Groups, plus a six-month service requirement at stations open to public correspondence.  (That "public correspondence" service requirement kept many operators with decades of commercial Morse service from ever getting a First Class license.  However, every maritime Morse station was defined as open to public correspondence even if it was on a freighter and never had any such traffic.)
>
> The rare Aircraft Radiotelegraph Endorsement to Second or First Class licenses required the same Morse exam as the First Class license.
>
> IIRC, the FCC required use of hand copy and straight key for Second Class, but allowed typewritter and bug for the First Class tests.
>
> After I left the US Navy as a submarine officer more than 40 years ago, I decided I'd like to try my hand as a maritime radio officer before that job disappeared.  (I was one of the few Navy people that loved going to sea.) I very much found the seemingly slow 16-wpm Code Group test significantly more difficult for test-taking purposes (when one is still developing skills) than Plain Language.  As few as five errors in the 400 character test could prevent getting the required 80 consecutive error-free characters.  It took me three 400-mile round trips to the Kansas City Field Office, only because of the 16 wom Code Group test.  The 20 wpm Plain Language test (given first) was always child's play.  I know that with practice and a mill an automatic unthinking response soon develops, but I did not get that far.
>
> For many years the FCC waived the Amateur Extra Morse exam for an applicant if he had held a commercial radiotelegraph license.  In the mid-1990s, the FCC started waiving the Radiotelegraph Second Class Morse exams for an applicant holding an Amateur Extra Class license.  That was a very signicicant relaxation of test standards for the commercial Radiotelegraph license, but by then there wasn't much call for the license.
>
> I never did get into Radio Officer work because a few months after licensing a new but permanent medical condition disqualified me from Safety-of-Life-at-Sea (SOLAS) duties.  During Desert Storm/Desert Shield the US began reactivating enough old US-flag merchant vessels that one of the Radio Officer associations solicited license holders for a short paid training program and employment as new Radio Officers.  Even 30 years ago there weren't many newcomers interested in starting a obvious dead end career, but 15 years earlier I'd have sent in my application if medically qualified.
>
> WRT Phil's comments below, it surprises me when hams claim adamantly that their Morse test was code groups.  I attribute that to fading memory.  Similary, it was recently stated that a Broadcast Endorsement was attained after earning the Radiotelephone First Class license.  The Broadcast Endorsement was granted only to Third Class license holders to show that the announcer (with Third Class license) also had knowledge to serve as transmitter attendant (with Broadcast Endorsement) at small broadcast stations.  Memory plays tricks on us old people. :-)
>
> Mike / KK5F
>