QST/January 1916/QST

by Hiram Percy Maxim and Clarence D. Tuska (editors)

A NEW WIRELESS ASSOCIATION WHILE YOU WAIT.

It seems to be the fashion to announce a new Amateur Wireless Association every few days. It reminds one of the automobile association boom. It was the style a short time ago to get up a new automobile association every time somebody thought of a new thing to sell. It became so acute that the American Automobile Association, the original organization of automobile users of America, were compelled to come to the rescue, and take steps to protect the users of automobiles. The uninformed man who had a car was unable to tell what he should join and what he should avoid. Some of them offered very superior buttons to wear in the coat while others beat this all out by offering a highly colored pennant. Some promised to protect him if he got into trouble for running his car contrary to good taste and the interests of his fellow countrymen. All of them required some cash payment for something or other.

The wireless world is apparently to be invaded in the same manner. Amateurs should consider carefully what these different associations offer. If it is a subscription to some magazine, and he wants the magazine it is all right if he wants to pay the price asked, which is usually much in excess of the straight subscription price. But, do not confuse this with our own Relay League, which is the property of all of us together, not intended in any way as a money making scheme, but entirely for our mutual assistance in telegraphing to each other, whether we are separated by a distance of ten miles or by the entire continent.

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THE VOLUNTEER RADIO CORPS.

Last month we detailed at length the efforts made by the Directors to place the League at the disposal of the Federal authorities for national defense purposes. This seems to have stirred the blood of many of our good American members, for wenow have the formation of a Volunteer Radio Corps being actively agitated.

The idea seems to be to have the owners of the best Relay Stations offer their stations to the Government in time of need, and bind themselves to comply with certain regulations regarding secrecy, permanence, drills and regular listening hours, and log records, just as owners of automobiles and trucks in England and France join in a Corps and offer their cars and services to the Government on demand. In Europe these Volunteer Motor Corps and other similar organizations have done incalculable good, and there is no reason why in our great country with its enormous area and its extended sea front, a large number of privately owned radio stations would not be of equal value. What is said upon this subject on another page should be carefully considered by those of us who look upon our country as something to serve to the best of our individual abilities, whether there is anything in it or not, in the way of personal gain.

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THE OSCILLATING AUDION.

Things are happening in the wireless world with a frequency in proportion to their radio origin. The amateur, as usual, is found following closely behind the leaders. This latest development, by which an amateur with an aerial fifty feet high and two hundred feet long is able to hear Nauen and Hanover, Germany, is very pointedly covered in the article in this number of Q S T, which every good relay station owner should read. The audion has come to be very common in our stations all over the country, and this latest use of it will sure to be taken advantage of by the more prominent amateurs at first and then the smaller ones. The only point is to find a way to get the results with inexpensively contrived apparatus. We can depend upon our membership to look out for this. We hope that any one with any good results to point to will send them in for publication, for the assistance of all.

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TESTING

 How many times have you tried to work a distant amateur and failed? And you felt that if something only had been done right you would have been able to reach him easily. Read what “THE OLD MAN” has to say about this matter. He seems to have given this practical operating question a lot of thought and every amateur should read his words.

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APPLICATION BLANKS

 Every man, woman or child who reads these lines and is interested in Amateur Wireless, and owns a station, should not put this magazine down until he or she has cut out the page which forms an application blank, and filled it in and mailed it. The whole success of our Relay League depends upon having a wireless station at the point where there is a message to be sent or received. You may not have but one message a year, but it might well be that this one little MSG would mean a tremendous lot to somebody.

 We at headquarters are working hard and enthusiastically and spending good money. You will help more than you think by sending in your application blank, and if you can show a working station, to secure the LIST OF STATIONS BOOK, and the APPOINTMENT CERTIFICATE. It costs you nothing but a two-cent stamp to send in your blank. The List of Stations Book costs you thirty-five cents, which is what it cost us. The appointment certificate, if you are appointed, costs you fifty cents, which pays for the certificate and the printing of this magazine.