I got into radio in 1973. Actually I was a little into radio way before that as my Dad was a radio technician. He sold and repaired CB radios in the 60’s and early 70’s. He had a shop in the basement and in his spare time, which I wonder how he had any spare time, he worked on CB radios. In the day of tubes, and single channel crystal radios with few that had the full 23 channels he was the repair wizard. I always envied his ability to check them, find bad parts and fix them to they could work better. In the 60’s a lot of people had CB’s it was the craze that was to sweep the country and it even developed it’s own set of terms but that is not the focus of this post.
My first radio was a Simpson radio. It was a tube radio that only had like 5 channels transmit, but had a variable tune for all 23 on receive. I don’t even remember the model. But the first real step into Ham radio happened in 1974. I was living in a small town south of Tulsa OK. In Tulsa in those days there were two Ham shops… Tulsa Radio Co. and a new one in BrokenArrow. I had heard about the one in BA and made a stop there one day… they had several radios and a station set up with ever more old used units for sale… I browsed the shop several times… one Saturday I had the saved money and as I remember is was about $75 and with that I bought a National 300 receiver… I knew I needed a license to transmit and at that point I didn’t have that license so I just got a big neat receiver that had a lot of knobs on it… boy was I set…
The National NC-300 is a dual conversion amateur band receiver that tunes: 1.8-2, 3.5-4, 7-7.3, 14-14.4, 21-21.5, 26.5-27.5 and 28-29.7 MHz The radio dial is also pre-calibrated for the use of optional converters: 49.5-54.5, 143.5-148.5 and 220-225 MHz It has a turret-type band display. It features a smooth 40:1 tune ratio with flywheel tuning. This radio does not have a built-in speaker. The suggested optional speaker is the NTS-300TS.
105-130 VAC 50-60 Hz 60 watts. 75 watts 19.5 x 11.25 x 15 inches 57 lbs.
I had a “boat anchor” and hung a long wire out the window to listen to the world… I drug that receiver from Oklahoma to Colorado in 3 different moves before I even got a license and transmitter but I sure had fun tuning it up and listening to the world… with not much more than a wire hung out the window… That was my spark, the beginning of my real interest in Ham radio… I guess it was the knobs and the lights that just grabbed me into the hobby but the ability to hear people all over the world peaked my interest and pushed me to get that license… although during the next 2 years I pushed the envelope in CB radio as the license there did not require a test… but I always would end up back on the old receiver as the fascination was there…
WD0AJG