[SFDXA] W2DU Walter Maxwell SK

[Bill]

 From Tony N2MFT:

 From QRZ

M. Walter Maxwell, W2DU, is an ARRL Technical Adviser (TA) in the 
specialty field of antennas and transmission lines. Walt was born in 
Daytona Beach, Florida in 1919, and grew up in Mount Pleasant, Michigan. 
A life member of both the ARRL and QCWA, and a Fellow of the Radio Club 
of America, he was licensed at age 14 as W8KHK in 1933, and has been 
licensed continuously ever since. He was graduated from high school and 
entered Central Michigan University in Mount Pleasant in 1935, earning a 
BS degree in mathematics and physics. He played in professional dance 
bands, and specialized in auditorium and outdoors sound systems until 
early 1940. Then Walt joined the announcing and technical staff of WMFJ, 
Daytona Beach, and was assigned the call W4GWZ. Walt also copied Press 
Wireless News Service from WCX/WJS, 38 WPM CW, while at WMFJ.

With the FCC from late 1940 to 1944, among many other tasks (see Table 
of Contents, ‘Tasks While with the FCC’), his professional antenna 
experience included participation in building antenna farms at FCC 
monitoring stations in Hawaii and Allegan, Michigan. Then until 1946 he 
was in the U.S. Navy as instructor of Aviation Electronic Technicians at 
Corpus Christi, Texas. While in the Navy he played trumpet in the big 
band of Alvino Rey, W6UK. From 1946 to 1949 in his own electronic and 
mobile-communications business, Walt did broadcast-engineering 
consulting, and was chief engineer of WCEN, Mount Pleasant, having 
engineered and built that AM station in 1948 (see Table of Contents, 
‘Broadcast Engineering Consulting’).

In 1949 Walt joined the RCA Laboratories (the David Sarnoff Research 
Center) in Princeton, New Jersey as an engineer, later becoming a 
charter member of its new Astro-Electronics Division in Princeton. From 
1960 until retirement in 1980 he was in charge of Astro's Space Center 
Antenna Laboratory and Test Range. More than 30 earth-orbiting 
spacecraft utilize antennas that were designed solely by Walt, which 
include ECHO 1 (see Antennas in Space from a Historical Perspective, 
‘The ECHO 1 Antenna Design’) and all early TIROS-ESSA-NOAA weather 
satellites. He assisted in the design of many other spacecraft antenna 
systems, including the data-link antennas on NOAA’s TIROS-M and TIROS-N, 
and on RCA's SATCOM communications satellites. He also performed design 
work on the Search and Rescue (SAR) system quadrifilar helix antennas 
flying on TIROS-N, which are used worldwide for relaying signals from 
emergency locator transmitters (ELT) aboard aircraft in distress. He 
assisted in designing the moon-to-earth TV dish antenna used on the moon 
on Apollo's lunar rover--the moon buggy. (See ‘The Lunar Rover (the Moon 
Buggy’) He set up its test-range facilities and performed all of its 
final pattern, gain and impedance-matching measurements prior to 
acceptance by NASA. He engineered ground-based antenna systems at the 
Kennedy Space Center, Cape Canaveral, for pre-launch communication with 
the TIROS and RELAY spacecraft while on the launch pad. (See section on 
‘Antennas in Space’) In addition he had total engineering responsibility 
for the receivers, transmitters and antennas of the five ground stations 
set up across the US, used in Project SCORE, the orbiting Atlas rocket 
that broadcast President Eisenhower's "Christmas Message From Space" in 
December 1958, the first communications satellite in space. (see ‘The 
SCORE Chronicles’)

Having been originally licensed as W8KHK, Walt has also held call signs 
W4GWZ, W8VJR, W2FCY and PJ7DU, the Extra Class license since 1967, and 
the call sign W2DU since 1968. Every full-time position in his career 
resulted from association with Amateur Radio. He has served as antenna 
consultant for AMSAT, as a member of FCC's advisory committee for 
WARC-79, and as trustee for K2BSA at National Headquarters, Boy Scouts 
of America, before they moved from North Brunswick, NJ to Texas. By 
petition to the FCC, Walt obtained the K2BSA call sign for the 
Headquarters’ station to replace the original call sign K2BFW. After 
retiring from RCA in 1980 he moved to DeLand, Florida, where he writes 
and edits using state of the art computers, and still enjoys music, 
playing string bass in small jazz combos and in a professional 14-piece 
1940’s Glenn Miller style big band. His favorite big bands are Benny 
Goodman, Glenn Miller, Duke Ellington and Count Basie. He also enjoys 
Florida boating in his 17’ outboard sportster. >From 1992 to 1997, he 
was President, Frequency Coordinator, and Data Base Manager of the 
Florida Repeater Council, administering to the more than 1000 Florida 
repeaters. A three-generation family of hams, Walt’s father was W8YNG, 
his three sons are Bill, W2WM (ex- WA2ETP, 5A4TY, AG2B), Rick, W8KHK, 
his Dad’s original call, (ex- WB2HKX and WB4GNR), and John, K4JRM (ex- 
KI4CVQ). His daughter Sue was KC4UBZ (license expired) and son-in-law 
Keith is WD9JCA.

See Walt's web page at www.w2du.com <http://www.w2du.com>

M. Walter Maxwell, 93, died July 3, 2012 at his home in DeLand, Florida 
of natural causes. Born in Daytona Beach in 1919, his parents were 
William W. Maxwell and Mabel E. Maxwell of Mount Pleasant, Michigan. 
Married to Harriette Coral Koster on November 6, 1943, until her death 
on April 20, 1985. He served in the U.S. Navy 
<http://www.legacy.com/memorial-sites/navy/?personid=158409702&affiliateID=1438> 
from 1944 to 1946 in Corpus Christi, TX. Walt graduated from Central 
Michigan University in 1954, with a BS degree in mathematics and 
physics. He was employed by Radio Corporation of America in Princeton, 
NJ from 1949 until retirement to DeLand in 1980. Walt was responsible 
for the RCA Astro Electronics Division Antenna Test Range from 1960 
through 1980. More than 30 earth-orbiting spacecraft utilized antenna 
systems designed solely by Maxwell, including the Apollo Lunar Rover 
system that televised astronauts as they worked on the moon. Walt was 
very active in Amateur Radio, licensed in 1933 at age 14. He authored 
and published three editions of "Reflections, Antennas and Transmission 
Lines" since retirement. He is survived by spouse, Jean Binkley Mayhew; 
three sons, William W. Maxwell of DeLand, FL, Richard A. Maxwell of 
Marietta, GA, and John R. Maxwell of Gainesville, FL; and one daughter, 
Susan M. Glasnapp of Delray Beach, FL; three grandchildren, Sheri A. 
McDonald of Lakeland, FL, Douglas M. Glasnapp of Fort Worth, TX, and 
Christopher M. Glasnapp of Reston, VA; and two great-grandchildren, 
Nicholas McDonald and Conor Glasnapp. You are invited to share your 
memories with the family at www.lankfordfuneralhome.com 
<http://www.lankfordfuneralhome.com/>.