ARRL Midwest Division Newsletter December 2014 … · ARRL Midwest Division Newsletter December 2014 ... (VEC,) in the Kan-sas City ... obtained via mail by sending SASE or by providing

ARRL Midwest Division Newsletter

December 2014

Kansas Radio Amateur Brian Short KC0BS Wins

2014 ARRL McGan Silver Antenna Award

The ARRL Board of Directors has selected Brian Short KC0BS of Olathe, Kansas, as the re-cipient of the 2014 ARRL Philip J. McGan Silver Antenna Award. This award is given to recog-nize excellent public relations efforts to promote Amateur Radio to the general public. Brian appeared in the Kansas City Public Media’s “Up to Date” inter-view program on KCUR-FM, in November, 2013. The show enti-tled “Exploring Ham Radio in a Digital World” highlighted Amateur Radio’s value to the community and explained how individuals can get involved. Brian has done an outstanding job of using both traditional and social media to bring the message of Amateur Radio to the public.

Brian is an ARRL Midwest Division Assistant Director, serves as Johnson County Amateur Radio Emergency Service (ARES)

Emergency Coordinator, and is a SKYWARN weather spotter. He is also president and frequency coordinator of the Kansas Amateur Repeater Council and of the NEKSUN/K0HAM group. He has been a Public Information Officer in the Kansas City area.

Brian is also an Amateur Radio instructor, and received the 2009 Herb Brier Instructor of the Year Award. Brian and Matt May KC4WCG have been leaders in the “Million Ham March” of HamClass.org. This group of dedicated Amateur Radio instructors has recently graduated their 1100th student! Congratulations to Brian Short KC0BS on his

efforts to promote Amateur Radio to the public!

ARRL Midwest Division Newsletter— Dec. 2014 p. 2

W1AW/0 MO—ARRL Centennial QSO Party Results By Ward Silver N0AX and Mitch O’Neal NW0M

After all the shouting and sending was complete, the Missouri team logged a grand total of 66,182 W1AW/0 contacts. (35,444 in May and 30,738 in October) That is a pretty amazing total and there were still people calling when the final plug was pulled at 2359Z on Oct 14th! In the second week, 118 countries and 35 CQ Zones were logged. 68% were from the US and we had 7% from Japan, 4% from Germany, 3% from Italy, and another 3% from Canada. The remaining 15% were sprinkled all around the world. The team was composed of 67 different operators: NW0M, N0AX, K0JPL, K0DEQ, WB0SND, KC0GP, N0TT, W2AGR, KD0PLS, W0HBH, K0ARY, W7FB, K0CA, N0TKN, N0ZH, K9ZTV, WA0IYY, WA0BSW, KD0PMW, W0NFS, N3PDT, K2HT, KI0I, KC0M, WA0JCO, AC0CU, W0RMS, AB0TO, K0KL, KD0NEO, K0LH, WB2UFO, K0LIR, W0TT, NI0R, AA0PO, AD0DQ, K2DP, N5RR, K0BX, AB0RX, W0MA, AD0JA, W0TSM, KW0KW, W0VM, KD0IXM, NS0D, K0TPP, KD0FW, WC0W, KD0UAG, WA0JRJ, KD0JBN, KG0KP, KD0AKF , N7WY, N7BD, NO0L, WB0IIS, KF0TW, K0JFC, KB0QHZ, K0OG, K0OU, and N0SO. This does not include any operators at club stations, such as the Boeing Club W0MA, who did not participate as indi-viduals. Can we work the pileups from Missouri? I think we can! Perhaps we should change the state slogan to The Work Me State. Thanks to all of the operators who put time and energy into making Missouri a very visible presence on the bands during our two weeks of fame as part of the ARRL Centennial QSO Party.

ARRL Midwest Division Newsletter— Dec. 2014 p. 3

Prestigious Larry Award Presented to W0KC – Norma Libby

Every so often, the Amateur Radio Clubs from the Kansas City Region come together to recog-nize an individual for their contributions to Amateur Radio. The first such award was presented to W0AIB - Larry Staples in 2012 for his work with Larry’s List, thus the award has become known as the “Larry Award.” This year, clubs banded together to present a Larry Award to W0KC – Norma Libby. Norma has been a Volunteer Examiner Coordinator, (VEC,) in the Kan-sas City Area since 2006. If anyone has taken an FCC Test for the Amateur Radio Service anywhere in Kansas City since then, it was very likely that Norma was there! According to the W5YI Organization, while they can't provide exact figures, they can tell us that since 2006, Norma has participated in 256 test-ing sessions, with 84 of those sessions where she was the Coordinating Examiner. In one way or an-other, Norma has been involved in the testing of hun-dreds of Amateur Radio Operators! Organizations participating in the Larry Award for Norma Libby included: Independence FM Amateur Radio Club, Independence, Missouri Blue Springs Amateur Radio Club, Blue Springs, Missouri Heart of America Amateur Radio Club, Kansas City, Missouri Johnson County Radio Amateurs Club, Inc. Overland Park, Kansas Kansas City DX Club, Peculiar, Missouri Raytown Amateur Radio Club, Inc. Raytown, Missouri Santa Fe Trail Amateur Radio Club, Olathe, Kansas Southside Amateur Radio Club, Inc. Grandview, Missouri Warrensburg Area Amateur Radio Club, Inc. Warrensburg, Missouri The award was presented to Norma during the Raytown Amateur Radio Club Hamfest by W0AIB – Larry Staples (see photo) and KD0HKD – Randy Schulze on November 1, 2014, and was a complete surprise to her! A video of the presentation, produced by N0IRS – JD DuPuy, can be seen at: https://vimeo.com/112062888

ARRL Midwest Division Newsletter— Dec. 2014 p. 4

WW1USA Special Event Station to be On the Air, December 27th and 28th

By Randy Schulze One-Hundred years ago, a great war was raging across Europe. Regardless of this conflict, a small mir-acle of peace occurred over the battlefield on Christmas Eve 1914. The Christmas truce (German: Wei-hnachtsfrieden; French: Trêve de Noël) was a series of widespread, unofficial ceasefires that took place along the Western Front around Christmas 1914, during World War I. Through the week leading up to Christmas, parties of German and British soldiers began to exchange seasonal greetings and songs be-tween their trenches; on occasion, the tension was reduced to the point that individuals would walk across to talk to their opposite numbers bearing gifts. On Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, many sol-diers from both sides—as well as, to a lesser degree, from French units—independently ventured into "no man's land", where they mingled, exchanging food and souvenirs. As well as joint burial ceremonies, several meetings ended in carol-singing. Troops from both sides were also friendly enough to play games of football with one another, in one of the truce's most enduring images. Special Event Station WW1USA of the National World War I Museum at Liberty Memorial will be on the air at Kansas City, Missouri to commemorate this historic event. The Warrensburg Area Amateur Radio Club will sponsor this special operating event at the museum, with assistance from the Joplin Amateur Radio Club from 15:00 UTC on December 27th through 22:00 UTC on December 28th. All Amateur Ra-dio Operators from around the world are invited to participate in this Special Event by contacting WW1USA on the radio. If you’re in Kansas City during the Special Event, all Amateur Radio operators who present an operator license will receive $5 admission to the Museum for themselves and up to three guests. (No other discounts apply.) Stations making contact with WW1USA during the Special Event can request a Contact Certificate through the ww1usa.org website, December 27, 2014, through January 30, 2015. A QSL Card can be obtained via mail by sending SASE or by providing other return postage. You can also obtain an Elec-tronic QSL Card via eQSL. For more details, please visit http://ww1usa.org.

ARRL Midwest Division Newsletter— Dec. 2014 p. 5

New Antenna Installation at The Radio Farm - N0MA by Rod Blocksome, K0DAS

One of my interests in amateur radio has always been antenna design and performance. A group of Cedar Rapids, Iowa area ham friends, in a loosely organized group called The Radio Farm, built a club station and operate the major contests. Our contest results from year to year are one way to gauge antenna improvements we incrementally make - usually in less than ideal weather condi-tions. Last October, we installed a Cushcraft ASL2010 Log Periodic Antenna atop our 65-foot tower near the farm house. The ASL2010 has a nominal gain of 6 dBd between 13.5 and 32 MHz. The lower photo shows the antenna being hoisted up to the top of the tower using a tram line. Brian, KA0YSQ, worked atop the tower.

One reason for mounting the ASL2010 on the shorter of the three towers at N0MA was to achieve a moderate take-off angle and thus be more effective in the ARRL Sweepstakes Con-tests. And this seems to be the case by one measure. In 2013, N0MA achieved a clean sweep by 0337 UTC - only 6 hours 37 minutes into the contest. This year, we achieved the sweep at 0322 UTC - a few minutes earlier. Of course many other factors affect these results but the main thing is we all work hard at having fun operating in the ARRL contests and HF an-tenna farming.

The Polk County ARES trailer deployed at the Patient Reception site for the Na-tional Disaster Medical System exercise in Des Moines, Iowa on September 4. (Photo courtesy of Des Moines RAA “Static Sheet” newsletter, October 2014).

ARRL Midwest Division Newsletter— Dec. 2014 p. 6

Around the Midwest Division

ARRL Honorary Vice-President Bruce Frahm K0BJ enjoyed visiting with hams at the SEAnet Convention in Bali, Indonesia. Bruce is on a sev-en-week trip to Thailand visiting his son Jon, KB0MBS and family. (Photo K0BJ)

Famous DXer Champ E21EIC and Bruce HS0ZLB, K0BJ enjoy an eyeball QSO at the monthly meeting of the Ra-dio Amateur Society of Thailand (RAST) social time. (Photo K0BJ)

Dennis Mason K0BYK, of Marysville, Kansas, demonstrated CW using a bug at the Onaga, KS festival of Lost Arts and Havensville’s Living History. Den-nis’s interest in Morse Code spans 63 years as a ham, and his careers in the U.S. Air Force, and the Union Pacific Railroad. (Photo—The Marysville Advo-cate, November 6, 2014).

ARRL Midwest Division Newsletter— Dec. 2014 p. 7

Around the Midwest Division

Sam Burrell K0AFN, of Burling-ton, Iowa was featured in an ex-cellent article “Wireless since before wifi” in the Lifestyles sec-tion of the November 23, 2014, The Hawk Eye newspaper. Sam has been licensed for almost 60 years. (Photo—www.thehawkeye.com/lifestyles)

Mike Rosenblatt K0BMW, of Bur-lington, Iowa was also featured in the “Wireless since before wifi” Lifestyles section of the Novem-ber 23, 2014, The Hawk Eye newspaper. Mike was first li-censed when he was 12 years old.

ARRL Midwest Division Newsletter— Dec. 2014 p. 8

Cliff’s Notes

ARRL hit the milestone of 165,000 members at the end of October – the highest that membership has been since 1998! Thanks to each of you for supporting our National As-sociation for Amateur Radio!

Ham radio received good publicity during the annual ARRL Davenport Radio Amateur Club hamfest in a newspaper article “Hams share love of amateur radio” in the Quad City Times. http://qctimes.com/news/local/hams-share-love-of-amateur-radio/article_a9413c1d-70df-5a08-a4c2-d81bde925865.html.

Kudos to Larry Staples W0AIB, who donated his grand prize $300 Associated Radio gift certificate received at the Raytown, MO ARC Hamfest to be divided into three $100 gifts to hams licensed less than six months and are less than 15 years of age. Donation of $100 by another ham allowed all four of the applicants to receive a gift certificate.

I have approved the application of the Iowa Wireless Amateur Radio Network of Parkersburg, IA (IWARN) to become an ARRL Affiliated Club. The application is pending before the ARRL Executive Committee.

As I announced earlier, I will be retiring as your Midwest Division Director on January 1, 2015. This will be my last monthly Midwest Division Newsletter and “Cliff’s Notes.” The Midwest Division is fortunate to have Rod Blocksome K0DAS as our new Director. Rod has done a tremendous job as Vice Director the past four years, and is well-prepared to take over leadership of the Midwest Division. It’s been a privilege and honor to work with radio amateurs throughout the Midwest Division to promote initiatives in public service and emergency communications, advocacy at the federal, state, and local levels, and education and new technologies. I would like to particularly thank the Midwest Division Assistant Directors, Section Managers, Advisory Committee Members, Legislative Action Chairs and Coordinators, and our Midwest Divi-sion Webmaster. The names and calls of all these members are on the last page of this newsletter. And kudos to all the clubs and hams who worked so hard on the Division ARRL conventions in Cedar Rapids, Iowa and Lebanon, Missouri, the W0DXCC conven-tion in Kansas City, Kansas, and all the state and section conventions and hamfests throughout the Division. And in addition, a special thanks to everyone who sent me infor-mation and photos to share with ARRL members in the 56 issues of Midwest Division News which I have published. The Amateur Radio Service continues to face a number of challenges. Three issues that I am particularly concerned about are spectrum threats, getting more young people into ham radio, and private land use restrictions which prohibit antennas and towers. ARRL continues to work diligently to address these concerns. I urge each of you to sup-port ARRL’s efforts in these issues which are vital to the future of Amateur Radio. Thanks for your friendship and support during the past eight years. I look forward to keeping in touch on the air and at upcoming hamfests and conventions. May the bless-ings and joys of this holiday season be with you and your families.

73, Cliff K0CA

ARRL Midwest Division Newsletter– Dec. 2014 p. 9

Midwest Division Special Events

01/03/2015 | Lake of the Ozarks Eagle Days Jan 3-Jan 5, 1400Z-0200Z, N0J, Lake Ozark, MO. Lake of the Ozarks Amateur Radio Club. 21.300 14.320 7.240. Certificate. Glenn Commons, 103 Helinda Ln, Lake Ozark, MO 65049. Please send SAE with $1.00 for 8.5" x 11" certificate.

01/10/2015 | Eagle Watch On The Mississippi River Jan 10, 1600Z-2000Z, W0CS, Clinton, IA. Clinton Amateur Radio Club. 14.255 7.255 7.045 145.430 - 100Hz PL. QSL. Clinton Amateur Radio Club, PO Box 1501, Clinton, IA 52733. www.qrz.com/db/w0cs

01/24/2015 | Kansas Day Jan 24, 1600Z-2100Z, KS0KS, Olathe, KS. Santa Fe Trail Amateur Radio Club. 28.320 21.320 14.250 10.115. QSL. Santa Fe Trail ARC, KS0KS, PO Box 3144, Olathe, KS 66063. Mahaffie Heritage Center, Olathe, Kansas. Kansas joined the Union Jan. 29, 1861. www.sftarc.org

02/21/2015 | 11th Annual "Freeze Your Keys" Feb 21, 1400Z-2200Z, W0EBB, Leavenworth, KS. Kickapoo QRP Amateur Radio Club. CW 14.058 7.035; SSB 14.325 7.240. QSL. Gary Auchard, 34058 167th St, Leavenworth, KS 66048. [email protected]

04/01/2015 | Lunar Eclipse Apr 1-Apr 4, 0001Z-1200Z, K0L, Emporia, KS. Emporia State University Amateur Radio Club. 14.270 21.310 7.230. QSL. Dwight Moore, Campus Box 4050, 1 Kellog Circle, Emporia, KS 66801.

For updated Special Event listings, see:

www.arrl.org/special-event-stations

Upcoming W1AW/0 Operations from Midwest Division

Iowa—December 24 to December 30

ARRL Midwest Division Newsletter– Dec. 2014 p 10

01/03/2015 | Ozark Mountain Hamfest Location: Brighton, MO Type: ARRL Hamfest Sponsor: Ozark Mountain Amateur Radio Group Website: http://w0omd.org

01/24/2015 | Winterfest 2015 Location: Collinsville, IL Type: ARRL Hamfest Sponsor: The St. Louis & Suburban Radio Club Website: http://SLSRC.ORG

02/07/2015 | Mine Creek Winterfest Location: LaCygne, KS Type: ARRL Hamfest Sponsor: Mine Creek ARC

03/07/2015 | SWIARC Hamfest Location: McClelland, IA Type: ARRL Hamfest Sponsor: SouthWest Iowa Amateur Radio Club Website: http://SWIradio.org

03/21/2015 | Nebraska State Convention Location: Lincoln, NE Type: ARRL Convention pending Executive Committee approval Sponsor: Lincoln Amateur Radio Club Website: http://lincolnhamfest.org/

04/11/2015 | Hamboree 2015 Location: Boone, IA Type: ARRL Hamfest Sponsor: 3900 Club Website: http://www.3900club.com

For updated Hamfests and Conventions Calendar, go to:

http://www.arrl.org/hamfests-and-conventions-calendar

Midwest Division ARRL Hamfests, Conventions & Events

Director: Cliff Ahrens K0CA [email protected] 573-221-8618

Vice Director: Rod Blocksome K0DAS [email protected] 319-393-8022

Iowa Section Manager: Bob McCaffrey K0CY

Kansas Section Manager: Ron Cowan KB0DTI

Missouri Section Manager: Dale Bagley K0KY

Nebraska Section Manager: Matt Anderson KA0BOJ

DX Advisory Committee: Bill Morgan K0DEQ (MO)

Emergency Communications Advisory Committee: Reynolds Davis K0GND (NE)

Contest Advisory Committee: Jim Cochran K0RH (KS)

Division Legislative Action Chair: Mike Edwards WB9M (MO)

Legislative Action Coordinators: Nick Critelli K0PCG (IA); Bruce Frahm K0BJ (KS & NE);

Mike Edwards WB9M (MO).

Assistant Directors (Missouri): Paul Haefner K0JPL, Ron Lowrance K4SX, Fred Miller

KB0WIL, Dave Propper K2DP, Barbara Rich KG0UT, John Rogers W0WC, Scott Schultz

N0IU, Kent Trimble K9ZTV, Roger Volk K0GOB, Bill Wheeler K0DEW, and Eric Zust

W0TT.

Assistant Directors (Kansas): Mike Albers K0FJ, Jim Andera K0NK, Andy Anderson

W0AFQ, Bill Henderson K0VBU, Charlie Hett K0THN, Jon Jones N0JK, Brian Short

KC0BS, Bob Summers K0BXF, and Rick Tucker W0RT.

Assistant Directors (Iowa): Don Boyvey AK0BG, Dennis O’Brien KA0DOS, C.W. Pantel

K0IIR, Jim Spencer W0SR, and Jim Lasley N0JL.

Assistant Directors (Nebraska): Frank Cahoy K0BLT, Stan Coleman N0YXV, Reynolds

Davis K0GND, Bill Duffy KA0VXK, Joe Eisenberg K0NEB, Allen Harpham KB0ASQ, Todd

LeMense KK0DX, Mike Nickolaus NF0N, and Art Zygielbaum K0AIZ.

Midwest Division Webmaster: Steve Schmitz W0SJS

Midwest Division Leadership

Midwest Division News and Photos Wanted! If you have news and photos about events or activities from the Midwest Division, email them to Di-rector-Elect Rod Blocksome K0DAS at [email protected]. We will try to include as many

as possible in upcoming editions of the Midwest Division News. Thanks and 73, Cliff K0CA