My Radio History

I first held my novice license but I just wanted to talk. So, I upgraded to technician class and got on six meters in the spring of 1962. I fell in love with six meters as a kid. I had my novice license and then my technician license. I never used my first novice call (KN9FMR) but as soon as I achieved my technician class license (K9FMR) The two bands easiest to use as a technician in the Midwest were six and two meters. The popular mode in the early 1960's was AM (amplitude modulation), and 2 meter FM had not become a popular mode. Most activity above 2 meters was experimental. There was some activity on 70cm, but not too much in the Midwest. I did have one acquaintance, W9AAG (SK), Dallas, who worked meteor scatter on both 2 meters and 432 MHz. (Back in the day, the term "432" was used instead of 70 CM wave length.)

My station was modest. I had an Hammarlund HQ-110 receiver and a Hallicrafters HT-40 grid-modulated transmitter pumping out around 40 watt into a six and two meter, single feed line beam. Eventually I converted an old, war surplus SCR-522 transmitter for two meter AM. After making only local (0-50 miles) contact on six meters, one morning I heard stations loud from the east coast. What an introduction to Es (sporadic E) communications! All the locals told me about Es and kept telling me "just wait!" What a thrill that was. The pattern for Es openings from my Midwest location was for the band to open to the east coast, then work itself down to the mid Atlantic states and into Florida and Georgia. 25% of the time the band would shift to the west in Colorado and the Dakotas. If the band was particularly strong, I would hear station into Utah, California and the Pacific Northwest. Fortunately, when I was introduced to VHF, the sun spot cycle had peaked in 1958-1959 which was one of the strongest cycles on record, and I was able to be part of that cycle before it began to minimize.

Our family moved to Utah in late 1978 and the six meter propagation is entirely different from that of the Midwest. I have never heard Europe from my location, but I have worked many Alaska, Hawaii and  Japan stations via F2-layer propagation. This was all prior to the introduction of weak signal digital modes. I currently have no six meter or two meter antennas because they were removed to replace a hail damaged roof, but hopefully they can be replaced soon, before the current sunspot cycle peaks in 2024-2025. I can hardly wait! This map shows the United States grids I've worked on six meters from my Utah location in Grid DN31xm. The map shows the period I worked on VHF from 1985-2000. Other priorities kept me from serious six meter DX after the year 2000. This map does NOT show the many Japanese stations I worked using F layer propagation, nor does it show any FT8/FT4 six meter contacts. Since my 3 element Yagi had to be removed when my roof was replaced after a severe hail storm in 2018, I now use my HF trap vertical antenna loaded for six meters...definitely a "compromised" but functional antenna for VHF digital modes.