[DX] The old is new again... Memories

[Bill Bentley]

John,
I have a photo album with SWL Cards from Countries all over the world and
from AM stations all over the North America. I even got SWL Cards from
Soviet blocked countries and I was probably on the FBI and CIA's list for
receiving mail from Communist countries. I did all of this as a teenager. A
few of those cards and letters are rare indeed because the countries they
came from are no longer around.

I used to have cassette tapes of some of the broadcasts, who knows where
those got to. I started listening on a GE 5 band radio that belonged to my
dad, he wanted it back so he bought me a Heathkit 4 band Shortwave Radio
which I built and later ended up with a Yaesu FRG-700.

John Peterson NX5E and Bruce White N5OGQ and myself were all once part of
the Midland Shortwave Radio Club...

Attached is a couple pictures vintage 1975 or 1976..


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "J Dyer" <jdyer at txol.net>
To: <Dx at w5qgg.org>
Sent: Saturday, January 20, 2007 7:44 PM
Subject: [DX] The old is new again


> Many of today's new hams got their introduction to the magic of radio by
way of
> a Radio Shack and the Public Safety band.  A generation or two ago, that
was not
> the case. As a kid, I didn't know how to spell propagation but I did know
that
> after dark my truck's radio would pick up such classics as WSM's Grand Ole
Opry
> and KWKH's Louisiana Hayride. I can't leave out the blowtorch signals of
KOMA
> from Oklahoma City and Wolfman Jack from across the Rio Grande.  I
eventually
> began keeping list of the stations that I heard. Today we would probably
call
> that a log. Those scraps of paper with the details of those old receptions
are
> long gone as are many of the call letters that I heard back in those days
but
> the mystery is still there. I decided to try something different last
night.  I
> had spent some time on the WARC bands yesterday evening but I no longer
was
> hearing anything that I needed. That was when I started tuning the Medium
Wave
> band. One of the first stations logged was in Wisconsin and running only
1000
> watts.  Mississippi, Minnesota, and others came rolling in. One
interesting
> logging was KGBC-1540 in Galveston with only 250 watts. All told, I logged
20
> states with the best stateside DX being slightly over 1000 miles.  Best DX
was
> Radio Vision Christiana in VP5 land on 530 KHZ.  I swapped back and forth
> between my Butternut vertical and the 80 meter dipole as signals changed.
>
> If you would like to try something different, spend an evening tuning the
"Talk
> Radio" band. It is a fun change of pace but very similar to picking a call
sign
> out of a pileup. Right now, I have the head phones on and am listening to
three
> stations compete with KXFR in Dallas. I think one of them is WOWO in
Indiana;
> another is probably  XEWK in Guadalajara. Sure wish they would give a CW
ID.
>
>
>
> John
> AE5B
>
> _______________________________________________
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>
>
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