KG5TNR clear; WB5JFP monitoring
Posted: Sat Jun 24, 2017 9:27 am
Received an email in the 1:00 hour this morning; my call sign has been changed.
WB5JFP was my father's uncle and my great-uncle. Indeed. Everyone knew him as "Cotton" which I assumed was because of his white hair. But, I gather he was "Cotton" even before that. I remember Uncle Cotton brought me silver dollars when he would come up for a visit. And, visiting them in Baytown was great. I remember they had a drip oil lamp in the living room, which had to be one of the coolest things I had known at that point. [Wonder why Mom & Dad wouldn't get us one. LOL] We'd get to drive through the tunnel, take a ride on a ferry, and get some popcorn shrimp. That was cool too until I grew up to know, bigger shrimp = better shrimp!
But probably the coolest thing about Uncle Cotton, he was a ham operator. He would tell me how hams could talk to people thousands of miles away and that was just cool to me. I remember when he started driving OTR. Then, he drove a big rig AND he had a tiny HT ham radio. The cool factor couldn't get much higher, right? ;) He would encourage me to get licensed. When I never gave myself a shot at being able to learn code, he would speak positives into me and knew I could do it. I thought Morse code may as well be an alien language and never even tried it.
I finally got my ham license last month. I looked it up and Uncle Cotton's old call was available. He had changed to a vanity call in 2011 when he upgraded to expert, and passed away in 2013. I will probably do the same and hang on to this call until I upgrade to expert at some point. So, now it is my tribute and a "thank you" to him and his influence.
Now, to learn some Morse code...
WB5JFP
WB5JFP was my father's uncle and my great-uncle. Indeed. Everyone knew him as "Cotton" which I assumed was because of his white hair. But, I gather he was "Cotton" even before that. I remember Uncle Cotton brought me silver dollars when he would come up for a visit. And, visiting them in Baytown was great. I remember they had a drip oil lamp in the living room, which had to be one of the coolest things I had known at that point. [Wonder why Mom & Dad wouldn't get us one. LOL] We'd get to drive through the tunnel, take a ride on a ferry, and get some popcorn shrimp. That was cool too until I grew up to know, bigger shrimp = better shrimp!
But probably the coolest thing about Uncle Cotton, he was a ham operator. He would tell me how hams could talk to people thousands of miles away and that was just cool to me. I remember when he started driving OTR. Then, he drove a big rig AND he had a tiny HT ham radio. The cool factor couldn't get much higher, right? ;) He would encourage me to get licensed. When I never gave myself a shot at being able to learn code, he would speak positives into me and knew I could do it. I thought Morse code may as well be an alien language and never even tried it.
I finally got my ham license last month. I looked it up and Uncle Cotton's old call was available. He had changed to a vanity call in 2011 when he upgraded to expert, and passed away in 2013. I will probably do the same and hang on to this call until I upgrade to expert at some point. So, now it is my tribute and a "thank you" to him and his influence.
Now, to learn some Morse code...
WB5JFP
