[GreenKeys] Police teletype

[Ralph Irish]

In 1969 and later, I had a second job at a two-way radio service and installation outfit.  They
handled RCA equipment at that time, before it 'surrendered' the name and became "Tac-Tec" or
something close to that.

The location was just a mile or so from one of the local police jurisdictions and that department
had assigned an officer to be the 'liaison' between the department and the radio store.  He spent
a lot of time there and we all got to know him pretty well.

Sometime in that timeframe, his department installed a Model 28ASR to work into the LEIN (Law
Enforcement  Information Network) system and it could also 'run license plates' from the Secretary
of State in Lansing, the state capitol.  (Michigan, since I didn't mention it above.)

While at the 'headquarters' I was chatting with the dispatcher, who was one of several officers who
rotated in and out of that job.  He commented that the machine was running, and making noise like it
was doing something, but nothing was showing on the paper.  I told him about 'Print Suppression' and
that some local department was receiving or sending things which made the machine 'do things' but not
print.  Every time it came alive he had to glance over there to see what was printing (or not printing!)

I opened the cover and found the Print Suppression solenoid and pointed it out to him.  When the 
machine started running but not printing, I pushed the solenoid in and the printer started to put ink
on paper.  He was impressed.

A few weeks later, the owner of the radio place got a HAL Communications, RVD-1000 or whatever the number,
and put it to work occasionally in the store.  He was not a ham but knew a lot of hams, since there were
three working at the store, and one more became a ham in the interim.  

Just for laughs, one day when the 'liaision guy' was in the store, the owner commented on the HAL thing and 
told him that he could install it in the station so they could see all of the traffic intended for all area
departments.  He took it to the station, found the right places to grab data and fed it to the RVD thing.

It immediately went to work and put info on the monitor he brought along.  The dispatcher was most interested
in what he was seeing.

Some situation came about where there had to be some communications between departments due to someone speeding
out of one jurisdiction into another.  Normally, one dispatcher would use radio to communicate with other
dispatchers, hoping to get a neighboring department to intervene and stop the speeder or robber or whatever the
situation was.

The dispatcher, seeing what was happening, grabbed  HIS  mike and announced that their department would help
by stopping the fleeing speeder.  He did this  BEFORE  he was asked to!  The other dispatcher was probably a bit
confused by this, but the stop happened and the other jurisdiction car arrived and wrote the ticket, etc.

The radio store owner tried to interest the Chief of Police in this RVD/Monitor device being installed on a
permanent basis, but when he heard the price, he declined.  We could have just as easy found a way to activate
that Print Suppression solenoid with a pushbutton, and the only down side there would be a large increase of
Teletype paper!  And, I don't know how Michigan Bell would have reacted if they knew that someone had been
'diddling' with their data wires being fed to the 28ASR.  It was all on a monthly lease, and if there was a
way to get more money per month, they would have been most happy.

Sadly, it never happened, but it was an interesting demo of what was available, back in the '5-Level days'.  I
don't know if HAL ever made a later model that would respond to  ASCII.  

The radio outfit relocated and changed hands and I've lost track of the original owner, although I'm told that
he is still in the area, retired and loving it!

73,

Ralph - W8ROI

-   -   -   -   -   -   -   -


On Dec 18, 2019, at 11:56 AM, Steve Garrison wrote:

> I worked a job as a police dispatcher for my local police department in the middle 80’s and I had a DecWriter for my communications with GCIC (Georgia’s equivalent of the NCIC).  While not an actual Teletype machine, it was referred to as a teletype by all of the officers and non-officers in the department.
>  
> Steve G./N4TTY
>  
> From: greenkeys-bounces at mailman.qth.net <greenkeys-bounces at mailman.qth.net> On Behalf Of Nick England
> Sent: Wednesday, December 18, 2019 10:54 AM
> To: Greenkeys <greenkeys at mailman.qth.net>
> Subject: [GreenKeys] Police teletype
>  
> FWIW - from a Craigslist Job Description posted 11/25/19 for Scotts Valley CA Police Dispatch/Records Supervisor - "... operate office equipment as required to perform duties of the position, including but not limited to radio, tape recorder, teletype, transcriber, calculator, photocopier, typewriter, and computer..."
>  
> (No, I'm not looking for a job - it just pops up when I search Craigslist for "teletype")
>  
> FWIW - the FBI had an extensive RTTY network using TMC GPT-750 transmitters and National NC-400 receivers.
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