[IRCA] Fw: (was: New MW QSL) Ernest R. Cooper? Part 2

["John Callarman" <JohnCallarman@xxxxxxx>]

Here's the middle segment ...

John Callarman, KA9SPA, Family Genealogist, Retired Newspaper Editor, DX-oyente, Krum TX (AKA Qal R. Mann, Krumudgeon)
----- Original Message ----- 
From: John Callarman<mailto:JohnCallarman@xxxxxxx> 
To: Mailing list for the International Radio Club of America<mailto:irca@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> 
Sent: Thursday, March 08, 2007 8:13 PM
Subject: Re: [IRCA] (was: New MW QSL) Ernest R. Cooper?


Jim Pogue wrote: "Gee John, it sure would be great if someone (hint, hint) could begin compiling some of these great stories and biographies."

THE FATHERS OF DX 
 

I suspect there are some of the names on Harry Helms' list which may  be unfamiliar to many of the younger DX'ers on this list. Perhaps my  observations about some of these individuals might be of interest. 

 

Hank Bennett - I've mentioned his name earlier in his capacity as  NNRC's SWBC editor. When Popular Electronics added an SWBC column, as  I remember it, PE first turned to Ken Boord as its SWBC column editor.  That relationship didn't last long, and Bennett became Boord's  successor, and served for many years as the primary newstand source  for SWBC information. One of Bennett's regular contributors, Joe P.  Morris of Cleveland, had established a DX'er registration program,  giving DX'ers call letters, based upon the 10 ham call areas, with a  WRØ prefix. When the popularity of Morris's program transformed from a  labor of love into a mere labor Bennett convinced Pop 'Tronics to take  over the program, which he administered, and the WRØ prefix became  WPE. I got my call in 1958 ... WPE5JH, when I lived in Hereford,  Texas. Later, PE dropped its SWBC column, but Bennett maintained the  CL program, changing the prefix to WDX. (When I worked at WMIX-940 in  Mt. Vernon, as a lark I sought and received a "vanity" call from Hank,  WDX9MIX.) Hank is one of the two on Harry's list that I have not met.  Hank also compiled and edited the early editions of TAB Books' "The  Complete Shortwave Listener's Handbook." (I let my early copies get  away from me .. I have the fourth edition, with Hank Bennet, David T.  Hardy and Andrew Yoder listed as compilers, and by 1997, when the  fifth edition was published, Yoder was credited as the sole compiler.  I had thought that Harry Helms was associated with this book, and my  copy of "The SWL's Manual of Non-Broadcast Stations," published by TAB  in 1981, lists among Harry's previous publications the second edition  of the Bennett book. Harry, in my estimation, belongs on the list he  compiled.) 

 

Gerry Dexter - When CQ began Popular Communications lo those many  years ago, my memory tells me that Gerry became its SWBC editor, and  continues in that role today. One of the more comprehensive  collections of articles on the hobby was edited by Gerry Dexter in  1986, "Shortwave Radio Listening with Experts," published by SAMS.  Gerry also for many years maintained a comprehensive and updated list  of verification information for SWBC stations. I met Gerry in Lake  Geneva, Wisconsin, in 1965 when I took an extended trip through Iowa,  Minnesota and Wisconsin following the NRC convention in Cedar Rapids  that year. 

 

Oliver Perry Ferrell - I had only a brief handshake with Perry Ferrell  at an ANARC Convention, in Indianapolis in, I believe, 1975. He for a  time had followed Ben E. Wilbur as the primary North American  distributor for the WRTVH, operating as Gilfer Associates (Gil, if I  remember correctly, for his wife's maiden name [Gillespie] and "Fer"  from his surname) and dealt a number of other special publications  and equipment geared for DX'ers. He was probably best known as the  compiler of a comprehensive and detailed list of utility stations on  the shortwave band. I still have one edition of his list, back when I  had a brief but passing interest in Utes. 

 

Bob Grove - I suspect there's no real need to thumbnail Bob Grove, as  I imagine we're all familiar with his "Monitoring Times," which I  believe to be the best of the comprehensive DX hobby publications  available since I've been aware that others besides myself were DX'ers  ... that'd cover a 55-year span. I suspect, too, that many of us have  bought equipment from Brasstown, as well. I hated to dispose of years  of MT issues when we made the move from Mt. Vernon, Ill., to Krum in  

2000, but there just wasn't room to transport them, nor to store them  here. I do recall Bob's publication before it switched from a  newspaper-style format to the magazine format it employs today. 

 

Glenn Hauser - [see UNSOLICITED TESTIMONIALS above] 

 

Don Jensen - Don is one of the real gentlemen in the hobby. Purely by  accident, we met in 1966 in the Chicago airport when we both boarded a  plane for Montreal, where both were to attend that year's NRC  convention. We got well acquainted during the flight. Don never became  active as a BCB DX'er, but he was possibly the greatest of all SWBC  DX'ers. I mentioned earlier that Jensen, Dexter and I were among  youngsters in the early '50s who contributed to Ken Boord's ISW  column in Radio & Television News ... and Dexter and Jensen grew to be  experts in the SWBC side of the hobby. I'm still a tinkerer! Jensen  was a reporter and editor for a newspaper in Kenosha, Wisconsin, and  he used his reporting skills to establish one of the most popular  columns in the NASWA bulletin. I wrote a couple of articles for Don's  NASWA column back in the '70s. Don's greatest contribution to the  hobby was to found ANARC, the Association of North American Radio  Clubs, which operated for more than 30 years before it disbanded  recently.  

 

Tommy Kneitel - The only contact I had with Tommy was when I wrote a  letter complaining about an item in one of his columnists' reports  that I considered to be an attack on a prominent DX'er. His response  was short and terse, telling me that he receives a lot of mail from  DX'ers jealous of the columnists in his publication. My disappointing  experience with Mr. Kneitel does not in any way diminish the  contributions he made to our hobby. Electronics Illustrated was  particularly good at documenting relatively simple construction  projects and providing easy to understand, step-by-step drawings for  those of us uncomfortable with trying to decipher a schematic. Many  young people were attracted to the hobby by Kneitel's work, and his  various magazines support. For his induction into CQ Magazine's  Amateur Radio Hall of Fame last year, the ARRL website profiles  Kneitel thus: "Prolific writer on various radio topics; columnist for  Popular Electronics and Electronics Illustrated; editor of CB Radio  and S9 magazines; founding editor of Popular Communications; author of  numerous radio books." 

 

Gordon Nelson - I have written many words of praise for this  electronic genius, whose antenna and propagation work form the primary  basis for much of the NRC technical library. Gordon's work spurred a  number of others to carry on his antenna and propagation work. His  greatest contribution along those lines was to make detailed  construction projects relatively easy to duplicate. When I edited  NRC's International DX Digest, Nelson's reception reports were the  highlights of the column. I have written in the past that I  consider my most important contributions to the hobby to be, not  necessarily in this order, the establishment of the NRC Log and  convincing Gordon to succeed me as IDXD editor when I became NRC's  executive secretary/publisher. When NRC's Pete Taylor hired me to move  from Houston to Cambridge, Mass., to help put WCAS on the air, it  enabled me to work closely with Nelson and to know him well. When I  married and my new bride insisted I divorce myself from the weekly  publication chores, Nelson saved the club by moving from mimeograph to  offset printing. NRC was the first DX hobby publication to go offset,  and the combination of the publication style and the large number of  technical articles that remain staples of the hobby resulted in the  club's unprecedented growth. 

 

Fred Osterman - Here was a young DX'er who was able to build a  business around the hobby, as Bob Groves has done. Universal Radio in  Ohio is one of the mainstays of the hobby. Back when I was an active  ham and attended the Dayton Hamvention, I made it a point to drop by  Universal's booth for a brief chat with Fred ... and a purchase or  two.  

 

C. M. "Stan" Stanbury II - This somewhat controversial Canadian was an  extremely courageous man, who fought a condition that kept him  confined to a wheelchair and limited the use of his limbs. He edited  the DX Down the Dial column of NRC's DX News when I first joined the  club in 1956 and typed the stencils with his toes. I met him at the  NRC convention in Omaha in 1959. He locked horns on several issues  with the NRC's elected board of directors in the late '50s over a  number of issues. He later edited one of the columns in Kneitel's  magazine, and perhaps the most intense memories of Stan's work was his  ongoing contention, based upon an inference he drew comparing 49-meter  band fade-out times, that Radio Swan was not located on Swan Island. 




John Callarman, KA9SPA, Family Genealogist, Retired Newspaper Editor, DX-oyente, Krum TX (AKA Qal R. Mann, Krumudgeon)
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