DX Records and Shortwave Reflections

…or, The Heaviside Road to the Antipode Summer 1924 brought the first explorers to the four new, shorter wavelength bands that were opened up to amateur use in July. Amateurs anticipated interesting times ahead based on their earlier experimental work that produced the first transatlantic QSOs.  Those had been achieved at 100 meters under special licenses for operating below 150 meters, a region the government designated as “reserved” the previous year without explanation.1 No one knew how the shorter waves … Continue reading

Transpacifics

Steadily increasing use of CW paralleled exploration of ever shorter wavelengths, and the two pursuits complemented each other. Amateurs were setting new records at a whirlwind pace. CW use in traffic handling had grown tremendously in the past year, and in June 1922 ARRL message traffic on CW exceeded that on spark for the first time.1 By the following February CW traffic accounted for nearly 90% of the total.2 Hams across the country found CW especially effective in summer when … Continue reading