KICKER: HAM TURNS 103 WITH PARADE OF WELL-WISHERS
STEPHEN/ANCHOR: For our final story, we roll out some good wishes -
really roll them out on four wheels - for a ham who just turned 103.
Ralph Squillace tells us how his fellow amateurs in North Carolina
took that celebration literally.
RALPH: If Oscar Norris W4OXX (W 4 Oh Ex Ex) is feeling lately like
he's the ham of the century, there's a good reason: Licensed since
1949, Oscar was treated to a different kind of birthday party when he
turned 103 on September 25th in the middle of a pandemic.
According to Tony Jones, N4ATJ, president of the Gaston Radio Club of Gastonia,
North Carolina, family members, church members and hams from
around the state piled into 40 cars and formed a procession past the
Courtland Terrace Assisted Living Center where Oscar lives. ARRL
section manager Marv Hoffman, WA4NC, presented Oscar with a plaque
marking the occasion.
Meanwhile, the birthday boy got busy doing what hams do best - making
QSOs worldwide via one of his HTs using EchoLink, which had been set
up on the Charlotte Amateur Radio Club's W4CQ repeater by Tim
Richards, KO4AXL (Kay Oh Four A X L). The club was honoring him with a
10-day-long activation of special event station N1O (En 1 Oh) - which
stands for ham of the century - and hams from North Carolina, South
Carolina and Florida were calling QRZ.
One of those hams was Oscar himself -- no surprise there. And, in true birthday
fashion, he was the one station worth bonus points. To Tony,
however, and so many others, Oscar is worth bonus points every day. As
Tony, the party's organizer, told Newsline: [quote] "He is one of my
favorite people in the ham radio world and outside the ham radio
world." [endquote]
For Amateur Radio Newsline, I'm Ralph Squillace, KK6ITB.
(TONY JONES N4ATJ)
**
NEWSCAST CLOSE: With thanks to Amateur News Weekly; AMSAT; the ARRL;
the Associated Press; CQ Magazine; David Behar K7DB; the FCC; the
Forks Forum; Irish Radio Transmitters Society; Ohio Penn
DX; QRZ.COM; shortwaveradio.de; Singapore Amateur Radio Transmitting Society;
South Dublin Radio Club; Southgate Amateur Radio
News; space.com; Ted Randall's QSO Radio Show; Telephone Pioneers;
Tony Jones N4ATJ; WKBT; WTWW Shortwave; and you, our listeners, that's
all from the Amateur Radio Newsline.
Please send emails to our address at newsline@arnewsline.org. More information
is available at Amateur Radio Newsline's only official
website at arnewsline.org.
For now, with Caryn Eve Murray, KD2GUT, at the news desk in New York,
and our news team worldwide, I'm Stephen Kinford, N8WB, in Wadsworth,
Ohio, saying 73, and as always, we thank you for listening.
Amateur Radio Newsline(tm) is Copyright 2020. All rights reserved.
--- SBBSecho 3.11-Win32
* Origin: The Thunderbolt BBS - tbolt.synchro.net (57:57/10)
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