Ham Radio operators have always been ingenious individuals. They often have been the innovators of the day. Hams are acknowledged to have pioneered and opened the high frequency radio spectrum beginning almost 90 years ago.

In the immediate post-WWII era government surplus radio equipment was unloaded "by the pound", resulting in a bonanza of precious radio equipment being made available to the ham radio population for pennies. As one direct result, a new dimension was added to the ham radio jargon.

Previously, hams used the Morse code or voice radio to communicate with each other. Surplus Teletype equipment became available at reasonable prices permitting hams to communicate by what became known as "Radio Teletype" operations. An ingenious ham could purchase a surplus Model 19 Teletype machine and connect it to his ham transmitter. This permitted him to communicate with a similarly equipped ham by simply typing the outgoing message on the Teletype machine and receiving the response on the next line.

Sound familiar? Today, anyone with a computer on the Internet can do the same thing with the aid of a messaging program, such as Microsoft Messenger. Heck, the hams have been doing it for 50 years!

Not to be content with that arrangement, when computers came along, hams substituted a computer and its monitor for the Teletype machine. This was much easier to accomplish and as a result more and more hams began using this system of communications. It continues to flourish today.

The computer revolutionized ham radio just as it revolutionized many other avocations. In the 1980's computer programs began to appear which made it possible for the hams to obtain ionospheric data from the then National Bureau of Standards and compute their own HUF and LUF charts. For the initiated, these letters stand for: Highest Useful Frequency and Lowest Useful Frequency.

These charts were printed for the 24 hour day and showed the ham which radio frequencies were useful over a given path. For example, if the ham wanted to contact another ham in say, Sydney, Australia, he could print out a chart for the HUF and LUF over the radio path from his home town to Sydney, Australia and then pick out the most likely radio frequency to use for the contact at the time he wanted to communicate. These charts are very helpful and have become more sophisticated as more and more ionospheric date is available to the public. Present ionospheric computer programs are professionally done and highly sophisticated. They also provide quite accurate radio path data.

Hams decided that a computer could be turned into a radio receiver. By addition of ham written programs, a receiver front end computer circuit board and an antenna, the computer monitor became the visible receiver interface. Tuning could be done with the keyboard.

This technique has come full circle and now computer boards are available which will turn a computer into a very sophisticated transmitter/receiver (transceiver). The computer circuit boards are built by a Texas company and are available at a reasonable price. The transmitter output is only one Watt, however amplifiers are available that will increase this to any power desired. Again, the monitor is used as the receiver interface and the computer program turns the monitor into what appears to be the front of an ordinary ham receiver.

What is next? Hams are in outer space with several of their own satellite electronic systems. Hams built the equipments according to rigorous governmental standards and they were boosted into space courtesy of NASA. Several of the Astronauts are hams and, when in space, they regularly communicate with hams on earth.

Fellow Hams, I guess the world is ours. I am one who has had this wonderful hobby since 1933. The application of the electronic knowledge I acquired put me through college both financially and academically and obtained a commission in the navy. Further, it permitted me to obtain related skills to build, operate and command electronic activities all over the world. It even got one of my inventions into the National Museum of Naval Aviation in Pensacola.