[GreenKeys] Police teletype

Fri May 29 11:09:04 EDT 2020

The Teletype Model 40 line included CRT and printer units.
http://www.navy-radio.com/tty-m40.htm

On Fri, May 29, 2020 at 10:51 AM Paul Heller <paul0926 at comcast.net> wrote:

> I don’t know if teletype made a CRT machine, but HAL did, for use with
> RTTY. I have two and can send some photos if anyone is interested.
>
> Paul
> W2TTY
>
>
> On May 29, 2020, at 4:27 AM, Steve Garrison <steve.n4tty at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> I doubt they are Teletype as we know them, but are just referred to as
> teletypes as most law enforcement agencies did at one time use them and the
> name has just hung around.  Sort of like folks referring to the brand name
> Xerox for any copying machine.  Unless of course he has now seen the one
> you got from Paul and he has verified that its looks a lot like what he has
> seen at work.
>
> Back in the 80's and early 90's I worked as a dispatcher for a local PD
> and they had a terminal, not a Teletype, connected to a similar, or maybe
> even the same, network.  They also referred to the terminal as a Teletype,
> but it was a dot matrix DecWriter (I forget the exact model number) that
> was much faster than a Teletype.   Now Teletype did make a CRT based
> machine (I think I remember -others help me out here) but I've never seen
> one of those, except maybe pictures,  I'm sure that folks that used to use
> those would still refer, in many cases, to their replacements as Teletype
> machines.
>
> Now I'm ready for the floodgates to open letting me know I'm way off base!
>  😊
>
> Steve G./N4TTY
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: greenkeys-bounces at mailman.qth.net <greenkeys-bounces at mailman.qth.net>
> On Behalf Of E.
> Sent: Friday, May 29, 2020 12:33 AM
> To: Robert Downs via GreenKeys <greenkeys at mailman.qth.net>
> Subject: Re: [GreenKeys] Police teletype
>
>
> Something interesting my brother told me a few weeks ago.  After I met up
> halfway with Paul - to pick up the Teletypes he was giving me, my parents
> called my brother, to ask him if he would help me with moving some stuff.
> He asked what and hey told him Teletypes.  He said, oh yeah, I know
> Teletypes.  They asked how??!
>
> Well, I ended up asking him.  A little background - my brother works for a
> law enforcement agency.  I won’t say who or what to protect him… but he
> told me that the office/agency that he works for still uses them!… and on
> top of that, all of the various offices/agencies around the state has one,
> connected to the same national circuit!  He says that it’s a two-week
> course to get certified on using one.  These Teletypes are hooked up to the
> FBI APB “wire” (well, at least I’m going to call it a wire ;p ).  He can’t
> take pictures of it because it’s in a secure location and the certification
> process is so that the FBI doesn’t get mad when an operator messes up… he’s
> going to try to get me the model number once everyone’s back at the office
> (pandemic!) - but he described it as a Teletype, being hooked up to a
> computer-like terminal interface, connected to the FBI.  I asked him how in
> the heck is the FBI still using Teletypes in this day in age and he said
> that apparently it’s the quickest way the FBI has to get APBs out to
> everyone across the country.
>
> I find it very interesting - the more you learn, huh ;p ?  Might explain
> why the one Policeman in that local newspaper article from last year said
> that they got the information on the wanted man they soon would arrest from
> “Teletype”.  Cool beans ;D ~
>
>
> On Dec 18, 2019, at 3:42 pm, Ralph Irish <w8roi at wowway.com> wrote:
>
> 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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-- 
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www.navy-radio.com
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