About

I don’t remember when I was first interested in radio.

My eldest brother, Walter, was a ham operator by the time he was in grade 9. I had an old military receiver, an R1155, in my preteen and up to my mid-teenage years. These were British radios that were common in bombers, and I used mine to listen to short wave radio and the scheduled broadcasts from the Penhold RCAF base. The radio operator came on the air twice an hour with weather conditions including the current altimeter setting as well as other notices to airmen (NOTAMS), which I would diligently copy down.

This surely set me up for my first career as a weather observer for Transport Canada. Later the weather part was split off Transport to become Environment Canada.

I was posted to an isolated station called Fort Reliance (Radio Call VFR7) at the very east end of Great Slave Lake, roughly 200 air miles east of Yellowknife NWT. At Reliance the only communication was via short wave radio for point to point, and for ground to air communication. We sent our Weather Observations as well as food orders, etc., and received administrative messages all on short wave radio. We could also send and receive Radiograms. These are the airborne versions of Telegrams. In fact, when our Radiograms were received by the radio operator in Yellowknife they would become Telegrams if they were going beyond that station.

After being in the south for a couple of years and some upgraded weather training, I was posted to Inuvik NWT, during which, in 1976, I studied for and earned my Amateur Radio licence, VE8WT.

When I moved back to Alberta in 1977, I was assigned VE6CKC.

I now also hold the Callsigns VA6BD and VE6BNR.