W1YL/7

Tonight, when I finished talking to an old friend of mine, Fred, in Seattle, the band was almost gone away. In a second, however, another old call has given me a call. It was Ellen W1YL operating remotely W7RN in Nevada. In dropping condition, her signal from that big station was loud and clear. At first, she could have moved to the West Coast. No way. She has moved to an apartment since we talked last time. She used to tell me she should give up operating radio as she moved to an apartment from her old QTH.

She told me she was not used to operate with K3. Such a modern radio, which I could never operate with, either. She told me she had not dreamed she could operate from her apartment like this way after having been a ham for 70 years. Remote operation has pros and cons in ham radio. But it is surely an evangel to a ham such as Ellen.

She told me she had attended Ham Convention in Orland recently. I am sure she has been inspired to operate radio through this way over there. It was the meeting where Tom K3TW found much less hams capable operating CW and he made a post on that problem in the FOC reflector. I guess it is a sad reality that there have been much less hams coming into this mode now. But like this Ellen, proficient experienced CW operators, might be encouraged to go on operating CW at such a meeting. It won't matter how young or old the operator is. It is the only important matter that someone activates this mode on some band.

This short chat has reminded me of old '80s when she as well as her OM, Bob, W1CW, were active on 40m late at night here. It was a real fun for me to talk to either of them those days. Ellen sounded as active as those days tonight. Hopefully, she may operate much from this station of K5RC. Thanks to Tom for his generosity letting her operate radio at his gorgeous station.