On Thu, 6 Nov 2008 23:40:24 -0500, "Eisboch" wrote:


"Tom Francis - SWSports" wrote in
message ...
On Thu, 6 Nov 2008 17:04:10 -0500, "Eisboch" wrote:


"D.Duck" wrote in message
...

"Tom Francis - SWSports" wrote in
message ...
http://tinyurl.com/5hkot4

Hmmmm....used to have one of those.

Bit of nostalgia...

My first, circa 1955

http://oak.cats.ohiou.edu/~postr/bapix/S20R.html

Here's the one I used to play with:

http://www.geocities.com/technician4/ronw1.jpg

Got to play with the exciter of one once when I worked some MARS phone
patches back in the day. I couldn't talk the Chief into letting me
fire up the finals on the big guns though. :)

I did get to play with an Air Force station at full power once though
- blasted a signal right below the lower end of the 20 meter ham band
on a phone patch to the East Coast - MARS again.

That was cool. :)

Man, we could get away with some stuff back then on MARS.

After I completed my initial and short introductory phase of military
service, I came back to the states and was offered electronics schools in
IL. I had been a Radioman and had a TTY repair job code, so my "watches"
during school was manning the base Mars station once every four days. I
didn't know much about Mars when I first started, but got the hang of it
after a while. It was always a busy watch, being the only military
representative on the net. Even did a few watches as "net control" a few
times.

The Navy radio guys were great to work with. Not a small amount of
hams back then either on the shore side stations - they had some great
base club stations too - all Collins equipment of various types.

I stayed with MARS for a long time after, but with the advent of new
technology, it became something of an after thought.

That was a long, long time ago. Now everybody uses cell phones, I guess.

Yep - that's the way of it. I try to explain to my kids sometimes
about the fun they missed back when cell phones didn't exist and they
just don't get it.