Radio and Electronics (Part 4 of 12)

I also practiced the Morse Code. Dad could help me a bit here, but it was mostly up to me. I bought code tapes and records which had practice sessions on them. I also practiced by taking down Morse Code directly off the radio. I found it much easier to send Morse Code than to receive it. I could send at 13 words per minute which was the requirement for the General Class license, but I knew I would be hard pressed to receive at the 5 words per minute required by the Novice Class license. The time soon came for me to take the tests. For the Novice Class license I could do this with a licensed radio amateur. I asked Alan Kidd, who lived right down the street from me. My Dad had actually known him as a missionary in Denmark back in the 1950s. I passed the radio theory with flying colors. But the Morse Code was what I was really worried about. I was nervous. So nervous in fact that I didn’t do very well at all. Alan could sense my nervousness and he had me take the code portion again. This time I just barely passed. But I had passed!
Then began a long process of waiting. I was thirteen and it was the summer. Each day went by slowly. I checked the mail every day. Nothing. I had heard reports about how the FCC, the Federal Communications Commission was back-longed by all the CB Radio license requests. The Citizens Band Radio craze was in full swing and it seemed everyone had a CB Radio antenna on their car or a base station antenna on their house. The FCC was trying to process a million CB applications a month and they just couldn’t keep up. Forget that amateur radio applications represented so much more effort on the part of the applicant. The FCC finally decided to forgo the requirement that CB users even have a license. There was so much disregard for the rules anyway. But none of this helped my situation. I just wanted my license to come so I could get on the air. I kept practicing Morse Code. I would practice having radio conversations with people in code. I’d use my Dad’s call letters from his most recent license, W7CWG. I would practice tuning up my transmitter (with a dummy load antenna) and adjusting my receiver. Practicing and waiting.