Amateur Radio

This has been my hobby for almost 50 years, since 1969. When I was first licensed in 1969 (I was 14) you had one year to upgrade to General or risk having your license canceled and then you had to wait a year before taking another Novice test. So in 1971 I passed my Novice again so I became WN9SES. This time I passed my Technician Class license 2 years later in 1974 becoming WB9SES. I passed my General Class in 1976 and for some of the year became AK9SES in recognition of our country’s 200th anniversary. Passed my Advanced in Jan of 1987 and my Extra Class 3 months later in April 1987 where I became NT9E. In 2007 I felt the need to try a call with my initials so I became K9DMW for around 8mo and then changed it back to NT9E. I hated the call on CW as I felt it took too long to send vs NT9E.

I taught Morse Code as a General with the Elgin Amateur Radio Society since CW was still required to get your license. I brought in 5 new hams to the hobby back in the 80’s but have since lost contact with all of them. I’m currently having my students log into LCWO.net and use the MorseMachine to teach code and I give a quiz over the material learned by utilizing 5 letter groups and send those on 2m FM once a week until the student is familiar with the alphabet, numbers. punctuation, and a dozen or so prosigns.