Untitled - Quarter Century Wireless Association

Olympics in order to train for the job and to iron out any bugs
in the radio installations.
Aside from arnateur radio, there was no other possible
communications for the snow-bound area. These ham radio
operators handled everything from ski accidents to finding out
which snow+at had the trainers' lunches aboard.
Esther spent 14 days at Squaw Valley, which, for her,
was an experience of a lifetime. She was one of three
BAYLARCs who served in this capacity. Altogether, there were
six YLs and about 50 OMs as operators and several other OMs
doing equipment maintenance.
Because she worked within a five mile radius of her
QTH for many years, she was on+all at the local hospital.
Whenever there was a power failure in the rural community, the
hospital's telephone system went out of commission and would
not function under generator operation.
Esther would supply 2-meter communication with the
hospital's headquarters hospital in San Francisco' These
blackouts occurred frequently during heavy storms,
unfortunately, when accident victims were numerous' The
telephone communications problem was solved several years
ago and a ham standby is no longer needed'
She has also been involved in community public
service which includes the following: RACES for 47 years,
guarding emergency frequencies during earthquakes, tidal wave
scares, forest ftres, and heavy storms.
Her QTH is within 500 yards of the Pacific Ocean and
those who live on the coast are very tidal wave conscious' Tidal
Riglrt after World Wff II th€re w€re not many
new Amateur tansmitters on the market; so,
most of us built orr own, eithff tom militaty
surplus radio eqrripment or frun soratch. My
first was frsn scratoh, a 6V6 crystal oscillator
and an 807 final.
Radio tubes we,re easilY obtaind
because the surplus stses had many t)'pes.
Moat mdio equiprnurt us€d during the war had
similar tubes as thry wene established tlpes
then. The 6V6 or 6AG7 tub€s were colnrrron
oscillators, and tlrc 807 was a 75 watt widely
used final; with care you muld drir,rc it to 90
watts input. kr that respec! it was a forertuurer
ofthe 6146 hrbe.
A two stage crystal cortolled rig was
easy to build (still is if you have tlre tr.rbes). We
used plug-in coils to set r.rp the band desired.
The tansmiuer would start out on CW but
later, by building a modulatoto plate, u screen
grid modulate the final it was not difficult to get
on AM ptrone, eith€r. The modulation
tansformer was the keY to success'
Being crystal conholle4 most of us
obtained serreral crystals, keeping in mind some
QCIITA Journal
My Early Stations
By: Pete lturdlmarL N7DUC, 3233 San Pedro Way, Union City, CA 94587'
codd be doubled and oscillate inside the next
bend up. Swihhing crystals was derrel@ to
allow all the crystals to be installed inside the
rig.
The next steP was of mruse a VFO,
which, in my case, drove me nuts for weeks
kying to get my hune brew VFO to stay on
freqr.renry. I eldEd up usug both positive, and
negative coefficie,nt capacitors, tlreofu padding
lhe oscillalor, and a glass bead supported
variable to tune the coil that was wound tightly
on a c€ramic form. Success came at last! It felt
like chains had been removed and I was free!
The little twotube rig made marry
QSOs, sorne of them DX. The bands were not
as crowded then as now and 50 watts worked
fine qr 20 or 40 meters.
Ilallicrafters came out with a twotube
rig, called the IIT-17. I had the
F{allicrafters 5-100 receiver and the HT-17
addition proved to be a perfect match.
I had much fiur with a center fed
dipole, and an end fd 7-W antenna. I used
eithera V-B€am m long wire pointed at Ewope
to enable me to compete with ttle W6
42
waves occur frequently following severe earthquakes and travel
about 500 MPH. Ham radio is an excellent checking system
during one ofthese events.
Her greatest joy in amateur radio has been in lasting
friendships she has accrued in her 48 years of the hobby'
Esther is one of the few women in the Society of
Wireless Pioneers, an organization of wireless telegraphers
most of whom were operators aboard ship or at shore stations
carrying marine communications. She was the first woman to
qualiS, for membership in this elite group.
Esther's ham radio activities consist of meeting two
nets each week, one of which is the Ironing Board Net, on 7233
kHz and the other is a round kble of YLs who live along the
coast and meet on 4O-meters, SSB.
Esther uses the Yaezu FT 707 series and she has
capabilities for using 2-meters. She said that she can still copy
CW in her head at around 20 WPM but has not used that mode
of operation for quite some time.
To say the least, Esther has given so much of her time,
talent and tenacity to ham radio, to military service, and to
humanity. She helped pave the way for women who choose to
serve in a military capacity and through her formation of
SWOOP and her ham radio writings, she has provided much
levity for those involved in the hotiby.
Esther, you are tnrly an inspiration to all who know
you. Former Lt. Given, you have given us so very, very much.
Therefore, we regard you very, very highly and former Lt.
Given we salute you for all you have "giveu" to us.
Kilowatters using beams. I heard ore time that
some W6s were running up to 5 kW. It s€em€d
strange ttr,at at tinrcs when hardly any signals
were heard tlrat Califsnians were working DX.
I always put il dov*n as skip omrditions, and
geogmphic adrantages! Hum!
Iater, I b,uilt a ph,unber's &light
beam, a mono-bard three elernent Yagi. I did
mnsider up to fiw elements for otlrer bsnds; but
I fuially settled on a full size three elerrpnt wi&
spaced Yagi fu 20-meters. It was big arrd I
nrean a really BIG antenna.
My advice to new Amatqrs just
starting ort Dqr't be suckered into all
cryrunercial equipffEnq ty building it younelf
It is so satis$ing to use troneb,rew gear and
erperiment with wire antennas.
There are some good DX reaching
models in the trandbooks. I-ook thern up and
buildoneoftlrem.
I hqe to wqk Yor with Your
hornebrew equipment sonredaY!
73 d€ Pete Harrdlnuru N7DUC.