"Doug Dotson" dougdotson@NOSPAMcablespeedNOSPAMcom wrote in
:

I also upgraded when the rules changed. Wonder why you upgraded since
you seem to have such distain for Extras?

Doug



So the bands didn't have but two "edges" to watch. Besides, my Extra
friends used to poke sticks at me at our oldtimer's breakfast. They're all
intimately familiar with my being able to make it work.

I was one of the troublemakers that started SARA, the Sumter Amateur Radio
Association, back in the 70s. We didn't have a repeater and ETV wanted us
to have an organization before letting us have tower space at 1000'. SARA
was the answer. It went along fine for years, a fun group, but there were
power brokers always trying to take it over. One night, in an attempt to
split up the group, one of them stood up and said that I had said one of my
buddies was just an appliance operator, which was true. My friend stood up
and said, "I agree. It's true!". The power boys walked out and never came
back. The club was fun, once again. We started having ham classes, just
for fun, because some of the wives and kids wanted their Tech licenses to
get on the repeater to call Daddy. The youngest kid I ever got a license
for was no record, but he was 7...(c; He cried all night the first test he
failed the code test on. His letters were so big when he was copying code,
he ran out of paper! We had a whole notebook of paper for him to pass,
next time. He just kept studying....and passed the 13wpm test next time!
He wrote those big letter really fast after a month of practice. We worked
real hard to get him his General before he was 9. Most fun I ever had on
ham radio...same as those old guys did for me when I was 10.

--
Larry