[Hallicrafters] More Cruising (or) Hallicrafters and Ham Radio

[Ron Evans]

It was October 1957; on the fourth of that fateful month Sputnik was 
boosted into orbit and the world would forever be a smaller place.

But far more earthshaking to me was a small white envelope that came in 
the mail that month.  The contents of that envelope were to put *me* 
into orbit!

My novice license had arrived!

Radio station KN5MVR was on the air...legally!

What?  Of course I bootlegged!   But only after I had passed the Novice 
exam and was impatiently awaiting the arrival of my fresh, new "ticket." 
  And, to make it seem almost "ok," I used the call of a friend of mine 
who never found out and would NOT have been happy about it!

But my bootlegging career came to an abrupt halt even before my ticket 
arrived.  Incredibly, my third contact as Bootlegger Extraordinaire was 
a ham who KNEW the real owner of the call I was using!  He began asking 
things I *should* know if I were who I claimed to be!  Did he know I was 
bootlegging?  Could he detect something different in the way my "fist" 
sounded?  I'll never know but I couldn't throw the power switch fast enough!

But now it was ok.  I was KN5MVR!  I had the "ticket" in my hand!

I had been introduced to Ham Radio by then K5GVC, Carl Boustead, a 
friend I had known from earliest childhood.  He attended Technical High 
School in Fort Worth, Texas and was, I believed then and still believe, 
an electronics genius.

When it became clear that I really wanted to join the ranks, Carl 
offhandedly said one day that we should go to town and "get some parts 
for a power supply."   After walking all over town (neither of us had a 
car), we had managed to find everything we would need to bring the 
bruised and battered ARC-5 to life.

Carl glanced at a 1957 "Radio Amateur Handbook" for a couple of minutes 
and then drew out a schematic culled from several different pages in 
that brand new red handbook (now older, like me, but still occupying a 
place of honor on my bookshelf).

Next came drilling the holes in a new aluminum chassis and then the 
mounting of the transformer, choke, switches, meter, indicator light, 
terminal strips, and tube sockets.  Then, an oversized and ancient 
soldering iron was plugged in, and Carl began to work his magic!  In one 
Saturday, Carl had the power supply built, tested, and "married"  to the 
old ARC-5, which was all I ever called it.  It was only later that I 
learned it answered to the name of T-22.  It was a rock-solid, low power 
40 meter piece of ex-militaria dynamite!  Or so I thought until I 
finally gave in to the lure of a newer rig -- a Knight Kit T-50.

I very nearly worked WAS, using the old ARC-5.  One one frequency!  It 
was the only "rock" I had -- 7186 kc -- smack dab in the middle of the 
40-meter Novice band, which ran from 7175 to 7200 kc.  If the frequency 
were occupied, which it always was in those days, I either waited my 
turn, or, more often, just joined the melee!  Others have mentioned 
calling CQ and then tuning the entire band, listening for a reply. 
That, too, was my invariable practice!  Very rarely did I work someone 
on my "own" frequency.

A sparkling new Hallicrafters S-38D and a Heathkit antenna tuner rounded 
out the station.  My antenna was a long end-fed length of wire running 
out my bedroom window to the TV antenna mast to a 45-foot wooden mast on 
the western boundary of our back yard.  The mast had been built from 
plans in the '57 Handbook.  I was so proud of that "tower."  My dad was 
a carpenter, but I had cut every 2x4, drilled every hole, hammered every 
nail, and screwed in every screw eye that made up that wonderful old 
antenna support.  I was so proud that he hadn't helped me a bit! And 
then -- I painted that Colossus (!)  with a bazillion coats of white 
paint.  It was to stand for 7 years, until I married and left home.

Then, one day Dad called and asked me if he could take down the mast and 
cut it up for materials for a shed he was building!  Oh, how I wanted to 
say "no"!  But down it came,  and up went the shed.  For many years 
every time I would visit Mom and Dad, I would go into the shed...and 
gaze thoughtfully at the wall studs, still gleaming gloss white from 
their days as KN5MVR's antenna mast!

Later the modest little S-38D was replaced with a used Hallicrafters 
S-85, which I thought was the premier receiver on the planet!  The old 
ARC-5 and power supply were lent out to a friend just getting his Novice 
ticket.  It never came back.  In its place by now was the Knight Kit 
T-50 and matching VFO, both lovingly, if not skillfully, built with my 
own two hands.  Later, the T-50 was retired and a gorgeous but "used" 
Johnson Navigator took over the transmitting chores.

In 1958, after less than a year as a Novice, I rode the Greyhound bus to 
the Dallas Field Office, took the General class exam, and sweated blood 
while the steely-eyed FCC examiner graded my exam.  And then, I heard 
the words that sent an electric tingle up my spine, "You passed."  A few 
weeks later, and another envelope came in the mail.  Now...I was a 
General!  K5MVR.  Few things in life have filled me with such swelling 
pride and joy!  Five years passed by in a whirl of states and countries 
worked, awards won, Field Days attended, flea markets survived (!), and 
antennas strung from every available support!

And then...life got in the way, and like most of us, I let ham radio 
slip from my life for awhile.

It was 1963.  I was trying to get out of college, start a teaching 
career, and get married.  Ham Radio would have to wait!  It would wait 9 
long years, until 1972,  before K5MVR was on the air again.  But the 
story of passing all the amateur radio exams again and applying for my 
"old" call is the story for another day.

But...still...after all these years, ham radio and Hallicrafters are, 
for me, almost one and the same.  Today, I have several S-38D's, an 
ARC-5 T-22,  a Knight Kit T-50, one eye-popping S-85, and  a 
bee-yoo-tee-full Johnson Navigator!  No, none of them are the same ones 
I had in my youth.  All have been acquired one way or the other and 
restored to the level of my competence, which isn't much!  I love them 
all, but only the Halli's can serve as my own personal Time Machine.

I sit down in front of the long slide-rule dial on that diminutive 
S-38D, turn it on, let it warm up for a few minutes...watch the 
indicator light gradually brighten...and...soon...I feel the weight of 
61 years began to slip away...and I am 16 again.

And all is right with the world.

-END-

73 es long life,

Ron - KD5S


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   KD5S  (ex K5MVR) - Loving the "glow"  since 1957
        Fort Worth, TX  "Where the West Begins"
           mailto: cosmos41 at ix.netcom.com
       http://www.geocities.com/sweetvengeance
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