Too bad Pete Hoover is no longer with us. He could describe how his
grandfather helped form amateur radio service in those days after the
Titanic sank.
Kevin. KD5ONS
On 4/12/2012 6:08 PM, Nate Bargmann wrote:
> In addition to the link provided by the OP, here are a couple more
> gleaned from a thread in the News forum at QRZ.com:
>
> IEEE:
>
> http://spectrum.ieee.org/static/the-titanics-role-in-radio-reform
>
> A short film:
>
> http://www.youtube.com/jkilts
>
> Look for the "Last Signals" video. It is a movie portrayal of Jack and
> Harold.
>
> For whatever reason the Titanic's call of MGY (IEEE seems to have gotten
> it incorrect as MQY in the article above) made perfect sense as it was a
> UK flagged vessel. I was reminded of mention that the "M" stood for
> Marconi in a later post. 1912 was long before internationally allocated
> radio prefixes. Oops!
>
> In response to the BBC verbalizing of the Morse messages I posted:
>
> Nicely done!
>
> What was left unsaid, and likely not germane to the story of the sinking
> of Titanic, is that the actions of too many of the amateurs and
> competing wireless companies' operators that night and in the aftermath
> led directly to radio licensing. In the USA the Radio Law of 1912
> established the federal government's authority over all things wireless
> and banished the amateurs to a wavelength of 200 Meters. It also
> required that prospective radio amateurs pass an examination and receive
> an operator's and station license from the Department of Commerce. The
> law had the consequence of cutting the number of amateur stations
> drastically but also eliminated the free-for-all days of wireless. It
> also had a few other unintended effects as well--official recognition of
> amateur radio and rather than killing off amateur radio as originally
> intended, it resulted in the eventual discovery of our presently known
> shortwave spectrum along with the drive toward CW replacing spark as the
> latter was more difficult to use on the higher frequencies.
>
> So while I salute those earliest radio amateurs, our service as we know
> it was truly born as a result of the tragic loss of the Titanic.
>
> 73, de Nate, N0NB>>
>
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