Radio Club Meeting

A monthly meeting of the local amateur radio club was held yesterday, and I attended it.

Thirteen people were there including an observer who passed an examination of the third class license recently and was planning to come back to the hobby.

Being near the center of a big metropolitan area, most members of the club have difficulty putting up big antennas at their homes and are not so active on the air. The average age is as high as, or higher than the entire population in this field.

Two real senior members showed up yesterday. One has a call with two letter suffix. Another told us that he first applied for a permit in 1939, but was denied due to security reasons at the time. He somehow went on the air even during WWII, and heard some U.S. stations were on the air in spite of prohibition. He became an engineer at a broadcasting station later. One day, he bumped into a colleague who had a "QST" magazine in his pocket. By the suggestion of this colleague, the senior club member got his present license. We had another senior member, who used to have two letter "J2" prefix before WWII, but he closed his station due to health reasons to our regret.

昨日は、住んでいる地域のアマチュア無線クラブの定例ミーティングに出席しました。

出席者は、はじめて来られたオブザーバー１人を含め、１３人でした。現在、交信にアクティブな会員は少ないようです。久しぶりにシニアな会員が二人見え、面白い昔話などが伺えました。２時間のミーティングのあと、さらに８人ほどでコーヒーを飲みながら１時間近く話がはずみました。