In the summer of 1998 I saw the movie Contact for the first time. Based on Carl Sagan's novel of the mid-1980s, the film featured Jodie Foster as Dr. Ellie Arroway, an astronomer bent on discovering intelligent life elsewhere in our Galaxy. The movie opens with a sequence where the viewer zooms out from earth, while hearing a retrospetive of radio history in reverse, beginning with the popular tunes of the mid-90s, zipping through well-known shows, commercials, and famous news reports from the 80s, 70s, 60s... all the way back through early broadcasts by FDR, Hitler, and Walter Winchell, on into the 1920s, all the way back to faint Morse Code signals. Then... silence. The scene dissolves from the quiet of deep space to Dr. Arroway as a little girl, ardently calling CQ on 20 meters with the callsign W9GFO (actually held by Richard Harman of Seattle, WA). After a moment of frustration at no immediate results, Ellie receives a call from K4WLD in Pensacola, Florida. (This is the real-life call of Randy Wallace in Rockford, AL.)
The movie which, to this day, remains one of my favorites, made such an impression on me because at the time I was studying for my first amateur radio license. On August 8, 1998, the day after graduating with my masters in mass communication at the Univeristy of Southern Mississippi in Hattiesburg, MS, I passed the two test elements and the 5 WPM Morse Code to earn my tech plus and was issued the call KD5EZN. I would not make my first QSO until a couple of weeks later.
Over the summer I had bought a Ten-Tec Omni-D, vintage 1980, and had listened the whole summer on a piece of wire shoved into the antenna jack on the back. On the 26th of August I finally got up the nerve. With nary an Elmer in sight, I loaded up an MFJ portable vertical multiband antenna on 40 meters (I'm sure my SWR was terrible!). I was determined to make my first QSO via CW, which - without voice priveleges on most of HF - was pretty much a must. I don't recall if I sent CQ or answered it, but my first contact was with N4ZMP on 7.115 Mhz. I know I must have panicked as, for an instant, the previous months of copy practice seemed to escape me. But somehow I got through my first QSO. When I told N4ZMP that it was my innaugural run, he was wonderfully patient and I think he repeated every piece of information at least twice. He told me his name was Orin, and his QTH... Pensacola, Florida! A short Skip from my QTH in Long Beach, Mississippi. So now when I see the movie Contact it brings back fond memories of a summer spent in preparation and anticipation and ended with a gratifying first QSO. Orin Promptly sent a QSL noting "1st QSO" in the upper left corner.
Now, fast forward a few years. Now living in Fort Worth, Texas, I had been off the air for for over 8 years when one of my bagpipe students, Richard Brown WN5S, saw a Texas Towers catalog in my studio and enquired if I was a ham. I had recently renewed my license and had received the catalog in the mail. Richard invited me to the Arlington Amateur Radio Club, and by the late summer of 2009 I was back in business, thanks to an antenna raising orchestrated by Richard and two other club members: Rob May NV5E and Scott Clark AE5PC. I soon began attending the NORTEX QRP Club meeting, hosted by Joe Spencer KK5NA, with Richard and Rob. Joe, a lover of CW and great collector of keys, encouraged me to get back into CW, but I was so rusty! So I busted out my old MFJ straight key and began listenig and practicing again.
I debated several times whether to get on the air and really put my returning skills to the test. And then one day last April (2010) I was lying back listening to slow code on 7.111 (still debating) and trying to pick out a call sign. Someone was sending CQ. I listened again. N... 4... Z... M... P! I jumped up without a thought in my head and answered. I had to! Orin came right back. Of course he didn't rememebr me, but I got to explain all about my first QSO with him in 1998. I'm sure it was no surprise to a guy who has made nearly 30,000 QSOs mostly on CW. But I don't believe in coincidences, and this was the first CW I had worked since 1999. And it was the same ham who had helped me break the ice this time around.
This was also a defining moment, in which I determiend to become the excellent CW op I had set out to be in 1998. Since my second QSO with N4ZMP I have acquired a much shorter vanity call - NV5F (notice a similarity to Rob's call?), joined the Straight Key Century Club, and started to spend more time with CW. It really is an amazing universe in itself and I would encourage any ham to explore it for it's pracical and historical significance, as well as the rewarding feeling it brings. There are several slow code and Elmer frequencies where folks are pleased to work at a slower pace and patience is the order of the day. Try 7.114 and the adjacent frequemncies. The SKCC - www.skccgroup.com - has a CW Elmering program, and just about anyone on the slow code band is willing to help out. Some of them are seasoned ops - like Orin - who often choose to work at a laid back pace. I'm glad I can look forwad to many a long, leisurely QSO with him and others in the future.
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Copyright © Virginia R. Smith