[Elecraft] OT: W vs K broadcast station callsigns

[Mike Morrow]

Another interesting fact about US broadcast station callsigns is that back before U.S. maritime radioTELEGRAPHY ended (except for rare historical exercises) in 1999, most US-flag merchant ships with radiotelegraph stations were assigned four-letter callsigns beginning with K or W.  There are no longer many such calls that are still assigned to merchant shipping.  A quick random search at:
  https://www.itu.int/mmsapp/ShipStation/list
found KPLB, WGDX, WQUI.  Twenty-five years ago and earlier there were hundreds of US ships whose radiotelegraph station had callsigns of broadcast station format.  Maritime radiotelegraph coastal stations like KPH, WCC, WOM used the same call format as some broadcast stations like KSL, WLS, WOR, WSM, etc.  Maritime ship radiotelegraph callsigns were not affected by location for assigning K or W as first letter.

Forty years ago I held a commercial radiotelegraph license.  After I received ham call KK5F, I day-dreamed about having a ship with maritime radiotelegraph call KKHF to match.  :-)

Mike / KK5F

-----Original Message-----
>From: alan at elecraft.com
>Sent: Oct 6, 2020 12:04 PM
>
>More than you ever wanted to know about the convention of giving "W" 
>callsigns to broadcast stations east of the Mississippi and "K" 
>callsigns to the west:
>
>  https://earlyradiohistory.us/kwtrivia.htm