There’s a group of people out there – men and women, both –
who are more giving, more helpful during emergencies, and probably less
appreciated than about any other collection of folks you could find.
Specifically, they’re amateur radio operators.
You probably don’t know much about them beyond those funny
license plates that combine letters and numbers and, underneath say, “Amateur
Radio” or “Ham Radio.” Or they may be
the group that you were blaming for interference with your television, though
it’s far more likely that such interference was coming from a citizens’ band
operator (an entirely different group, most of whom have no knowledge of radio
technology). The CB operator is
interested solely in communicating with other CB operators – at their licensed
or greatly-increased power.
Why am I writing about amateur radio operators?
Well, first, to say thanks.
You’ll find ham operators helping out in just about any emergency. And the bigger the problem, the more they
seem to offer. Emergency radio traffic
and messages, coordination of aid and relief, even first aid and delivery of
medicine. More than once, ham operators
have been pressed into service as air traffic controllers operating at ad hoc
air strips when airports have been closed.
In many places they’re still the backbone of the public’s
side of emergency action.
It’s for the money, right?
Uh, no. Especially since
operating on any of the amateur frequencies (bands) requires a license which
explicitly forbids use of amateur radio for “pecuniary interest.” No.
They do it for the service. And
they maintain readiness – regular meetings, field day operations (going out,
setting up temporary operations and passing traffic on a regular basis),
meetings with local, state and even federal emergency officials.
Quakes, hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, lost children, just
about any emergency you can imagine, you’ll find amateur radio operators
mobilizing to help.
And you ask again, why am I writing about this?
Well, I spent a part of a recent weekend at a
“hamfest”. This is a convention of
amateur radio operators. It consists of
learning sessions, FCC examinations, group meetings (like emergency operating
groups), and an esoteric flea market offering items 99 percent of folks
wouldn’t recognize, let alone want.
If you have interest in radio technology – and by that I
mean any sort of wireless communication – it’s a blast. You can find everything from the latest
computer and wifi gear to an iconoscope.
And if ever there were a place where one man’s junk is…well, this is it.
Cool. And, yet one
more time, why am I writing about this?
Well, by observation, I’ve established that the average age of a ham
operator is somewhere between 60 and deceased.
There’s just been very little influx.
Nothing to interest the kiddies.
And that’s doubly disappointing since most amateurs acquired their first
[usually “novice”] license in their early teens – or before!
So I got to thinking, why the lack of newbies? Here’s what I’ve come up with
· The mystique is gone. Once upon a time, you could tune up your
homebrew rig into a homebrew antenna and “work” into any number of states and,
depending on frequency, around the world.
You’d exchange QSL cards with the other party, noting the specifics of
the contact. Today, you boot up your
factory-made computer using your factory-written OS into a factory-made modem
and across a pair of wires (possibly through a factory-made wifi
transmitter/receiver) to your Facebook page.
There, someone may have left a message wanting to contact you. Afterward, you may even exchange emails. There was a magic to waves leaving an antenna
and delivering a message halfway around the world. That’s been doused by the multitude of means
by which we can achieve the same end.
For some, there’s a bigger mystery to data packets migrating from device
to air to line to server to line to server to friend to deliver the message, “C
U L8r.”
There’s
just no big deal to radio.
· It’s a throwaway society. Kids want the latest and the best. Build something? Nah.
Takes too long. And, besides, I
want the same xyz that everyone else has.
· There’s not a lot of interest in helping
others. Wow! Where’d that come from? Well, with FEMA around along with a number of
other government agencies, a lot of people feel that their taxes are taking
care of paying for emergencies and for the help needed in the middle of them. “Hey, I pay my taxes. I shouldn’t have to do more than that,” seems
to be the battle cry. Worse, though, are
the reports that some government agencies have become uncooperative – eschewing
the help of dangerously suspect outsiders like ham operators.
The real loss is in the
technology that’s not being developed.
If you look back through the history of radio and television, you’ll see
so much of the development came from individuals applying for and operating
experimental stations, or holding “ham” tickets. 2XG was Lee DeForest’s experimental radio
station in New York. If it weren’t for
DeForest’s audion, we’d still be waiting for anything beyond Morse code. Charles
Herrold’s 6XF became KQW which then became KCBS. There are many of others –
launched by rugged individualists rather than corporations. And Philo T. Farnsworth and his work with
television changed the “face” of communication.
I call them rugged because you have to know that they were bitten by
their power supplies once or twice. No
fun.
Usually on their own,
they develop circuits, write software, and spend their own time putting it all
together to create a new product or service.
And they do it because they just want to. Most realize that they’ll never see an
ROI. But that’s not what they’re
about. It’s that big smile when they break
the distance record at 243gHz or do a moonbounce, or radio-control their
lawnmower.
And a lot of products
have come from them – not all from the knowledge required for the license,
itself, but from the analytical thinking that it brings about. And we owe a lot more to ham operators than
we admit. For everything they’ve
created, for the services they perform, and because, by a far greater
percentage than the general population, they’re genuinely good people.
By the way, if you’re one
of those genuinely good people and you’ve always wanted to figure out how
things work, or build something electronic, an amateur radio ticket isn’t that
hard to get. You can ask around or check
the web. Arrl.org (American Radio Relay
League) is a great place to start. If
you have a kid who’s interested in the subject, send him or her there,
too. In fact, it can be a pretty cool
family pursuit. For younger folk,
besides the radio experience, a ham ticket today provides a good foundation for
the IT world. And, by the way, the
converse – IT being a good foundation for radio/television – isn’t necessarily
true!
So thanks, to all of you
out there having fun helping.
NB: Just a few
additional noteworthy hams: Howard Hughes,
Nolan Bushnell (Atari) Reginald Aubrey Fessenden (first transmission of
human voice), Robert Moog, Julian Hirsch, Luke Montgomery, Steve Wozniak, Joseph
H. Taylor, Jack Kilby, Leo Fender, David Packard (the “P” in “HP”), Wilson Greatbatch (invented the pacemaker), Perry
Spencer (inventor of the microwave oven)
Norio Ohga and Akio Morita (Chairman and Founder of Sony, respectively)
and about half of all astronauts!
