Jonesy, W3DHJ -- Penna., 1955 |
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| It is "Jonesy, W3DHJ, Colorado" now because the first "W3DHJ" was my father, Melvin R. Jones. Back then it was "Jonesy, W3DHJ, Pennsylvania". My father was a career U.S. Army officer -- serving from before WW II until his retirement as a Lt. Colonel in 1962. (Which, of course, made me a bona fide Army Brat.) My father was born in 1917 and grew up in Big Bear, California (as did his wife - my mom.) He started his deep, life-long interest in amateur radio in the early 1930's. He once confided in me that he did some bootlegging as "W6MJ" (or "W6MRJ") before he had the opportunity to travel to Los Angeles and take the FCC exam(s).  My
dad first enlisted in the U.S. Army on February 26, 1937, and served
his hitch in The Ordnance Dept at
the brand-new Hickam Field, Hawaii. He mustered out in early 1940 and
knocked about
on the west coast before being swept back up by the events of December
7, 1941.He found his prior enlistment experience was a 'plus' in those early days of the war, and he was entered into OTS (Officer Training School.) He was a 90-Day Wonder. This picture is from 1942, and was taken when he was a Lieutenant stationed at Aberdeen Proving Grounds, Maryland.  He
traveled the world as a U.S. Army officer in
The Corps of Engineers. Shortly after WW II he was assigned
to the rebuilding of Tachikawa Air Base near Yokohama, Japan. My mom,
along with me and my younger sister, were on the first boatload of
American military dependents that sailed into Tokyo harbor after WW II.
I remember, vaguely, his ham shack in a 'spare' bedroom. And, I
remember his 75M and 40M dipoles hanging from tall
telephone poles in our backyard in the newly-built housing area. (Being
an officer in the Corps of Engineers had its perks for
a die-hard amateur radio operator!) One pole also held up a homebrew
20M yagi. |
| He held a JA1
license while stationed in Japan. But, to my eternal regret,
I do not know (or remember) what it was. For a time he was
TDY to Clark Field in the Philippines, and I believe he obtained a DU1 license while
there. After returning state-side, we moved from duty assignment to duty assignment: Florida, Utah, Wyoming, Arizona, California (twice), and Washington state. This was back in the days when the FCC required amateur radio operators to apply for a new callsign within 90 days of moving into a different call district. Some of the calls he held during this time were: W4RYA, W7PFM, and a W6 call I do not remember.  In
1952 he was transferred from The
Hanford
Atomic Energy
Commission site in Washington state to West Germany (USAREUR) as Deputy
Post
Engineer of The Bremerhaven Port Of Embarkation (B.P.O.E.). There he
was licensed as DL4ER
and
his ham shack (again, a 'spare' bedroom) contained a BC-610
transmitter and an HRO-50
receiver. 
He had a 50 foot
'shop-built' tower and a full-sized, interlaced 10-15-20M 'shop-built'
yagi on top -- rotated by a war surplus prop-pitch motor and aimed with
a pair of war surplus selsyn motors. (Again, being an officer
in the Corps of Engineers had its perks.)In April, 1953 he was promoted to Major. Then in May, 1955 he was transferred back to the states -- as Post Engineer for The Valley Forge Army Hospital near Phoenixville, Penna. And, as was required, he applied to the FCC for a new callsign. 1955: W3DHJ - "Double Headed Jones"  This was a "PR" picture dated "Sept., 1955" taken at Valley Forge Army Hospital for the post newspaper. It probably accompanied some sort of Introduction-to-the-new-Post-Engineer article. No doubt the intent was to show his 'softer side' as an amateur radio operator. HI!HI! The vehicle is a 1955 Ford station wagon. No air bag on that steering wheel, and no car safety seats were needed when you had a 16 gauge steel dashboard protecting you! The mobile equipment consisted of a Harvey-Wells TBS-50C "BandMaster, Senior" transmitter (AM - 50W Input) bolted to the drive shaft hump and dashboard. It is crystal controlled in this picture. Later he added the Harvey-Wells BandMaster VFO. For receiving he used a Gonset HF converter (bolted to the steering column) piped into the car's AM radio. (You encountered damn few 'appliance operators' in those days!)  We lived in Creamery -- some 30
miles northwest of Valley
Forge Army Hospital. This rental house had no 'spare'
bedroom, so the ham shack was in one corner of the kitchen! My mother,
a life-long suffering Army Wife and
a
life-long suffering XYL, was (and is) a
saint!His "shack" consisted of a National HRO-50 receiver, a National speaker, and a Central Electronics Sibeband Slicer in a short 19 inch rack, together with a Hammarlund HC-10 SSB Adapter, a Collins 32V-3 transmitter, a Central Electronics 20A exciter, an Astatic D-104 microphone, a Phone Patch and an clunky, black telephone -- all sitting atop a Johnson Viking Kilowatt Desk! -- in the corner of the kitchen!!! That's the kitchen table by his right forearm! His operating chair - when turned around - became his kitchen chair! My mother was (and is) a super saint! The mannequin head was a gag gift to Ol' Double Head from a fellow ham. If you click on the image to the right, you'll load a 300kB copy (in a new window or tab) and you can spend sometime, yourself, trying to locate and identify all the gear there -- including things I may have missed. Email me any discrepancies, please. In the backyard were two telephone poles holding up a 75M dipole, an HF yagi, and a 10M ground plane. |
 It was during
these
next 3 years (1955-56-57) that
my dad first took an interest in SSB -- using the necessary adapters
for the Collins
32V-3 transmitter and
the HRO-50 receiver. He
spent his
evenings with the gang that camped out on "3999.9" kcs. -- lower
sideband. Also, he took an
interest in 10M mobile and was quite active
in the Phil-Mont
Mobile Radio Club. The club
freq's were 29.493 and 28.888 mcs. back in those days. He was also
very,
very active with The North Penn
Amateur Radio Club -- loosely centered
in Montgomery County. The club freq. was 29.520 mcs. He served in many
officer positions in both clubs - including
serving as president of each. I was 'active' with him (tho'
unlicensed myself, at the time), and we shared times at Field Day, at
the frequent auctions held during club meetings, and on the monthly 10M
Hidden Transmitter Hunts. Great Days, those!In early 1958, he was assigned to MAAG (Military Advisory & Assistance Group) Headquarters in Siagon, South Viet-Nam. He spent a year there without us (- the family), and during that time, he and another fellow ham stationed in Siagon, got 3W licenses under 'special circumstances' -- because South Viet-Nam, along with Albania, East Germany, and a few others were "banned countries" for U.S. amateur radio operators by the FCC. They operated a MARS station and (I believe) some amateur HF. [I need to research this more. I do remember it was written up in QST at the time -- sometime in 1958.] In 1959 he returned from South Viet-Nam and was assigned as The Post Engineer at The Philadelphia Quartermaster Depot in south Philadelphia. So, he was able to keep his W3DHJ callsign. Now we lived in a rented house in Rahns -- out in Montgomery County near the old Creamery QTH -- and this time there was a 'spare' bedroom to make over as a ham shack.  Field
Day 1960 with The North Penn
Amateur Radio Club. That's
him
at the mic. in the photograph -- with me logging -- on the tailgate
of a station wagon. I recognize neither the transmitter
(Collins?) nor the receiver (Hammarlund
HQ-180?). The mic. was his,
tho'. I recognized it in the picture as one of the microphones I
got
from his estate. Field Day was a lot different in the days of vacuum
tubes! The club had at least 2 bodacious, trailer-mounted,
gasoline-powered, exhaust belching generators that required constant
attention to run the full 24 hours of the 'contest'. He picked right back up where he left off: active once again with The Phil-Mont Mobile Radio Club and The North Penn Amateur Radio Club; active on 75M SSB; and active on 10M mobile during the 40 mile one-way commute between home and south Philadelphia each day. He still had the Johnson Viking Kilowatt Desk. For awhile, an HRO-60 replaced his old HRO-50 receiver. Later he upgraded to a NC-303 receiver. I forget what SSB exciter he had. And, once again, in the backyard were two telephone poles holding up a 75M dipole, an HF yagi, and a 10M ground plane. He loved those telephone poles! |
 He
was promoted to Lt. Colonel in June, 1961. This
was his last duty assignment until his retirement in September, 1962.
(I had
graduated from high
school and enlisted
in the U.S. Air Force in 1961.) This unmarked and undated photograph is
believed to have been taken just shortly before his retirement. Upon
his
retirement, he and
my mother moved to Glenwood Springs, Colorado. Once again, as
was dictated by the FCC, he was forced to to give up his W3 callsign and
apply for a new one in the tenth-call district. He
was assigned the
call letters: WØHLD. "Here Lies Doublehead"
as his old buddies back in Pennsylvania proclaimed.For a number of years he and my mom traveled with a trailer throughout the American southwest, and into N.W. Mexico. He operated mobile with a Hallicrafters SR-150 during those days  His
final station setup consisted of a Kenwood
TS-520, the SM-520
station monitor, and alternated between the Johnson Viking Kilowatt
Desk and a Heathkit SB-220
that was a piece of art. I
still
use his TS-520 on the
(pre-WARC) HF bands. His telephone pole
climbing days were behind him, and he was using a CushCraft tri-bander
on
top of a tilt-over, crank-up mast. He
died in a V.A. Nursing Home in
Rifle, Colorado at the age
of 78 in November, 1995 due to COPD (Chronic
Obstructive Pulmonary Disease.) His early death can be blamed on
smoking 2-3 packs of Chesterfields
per day for as long as (or longer than) he had been licensed.  It
was in the early
Summer of the next year (1996) that the
FCC instituted the "Close Relative of Former Holder, now Deceased,
Provision" under the "Vanity Callsign Program" whereby I, as his son
and a licensed amateur radio operator (WBØGNO),
could apply for his call. And, it was no longer an FCC
requirement that license holders be assigned in-district callsigns.My dad was never 'excited' about his last callsign: WØHLD. It didn't carry the 'cachet' that his old W3DHJ did. I, too, held the old W3DHJ call letters in more reverence. I did some research and it had never been reassigned since he had given it up in 1962. So, with photocopies of his old FCC licenses, I applied for it. It was with great excitement that, late in July of 1996, I saw my new call letter assignment in the FCC database. It was several hours later - when I was starting to calm down - that I realized that the date of issue: July 24, was my dad's birthday! My dad was a great tinkerer, as well as a great operator. He built almost all of the antennas he used over the years. He constructed many pieces of equipment from QST articles. He applied his engineering talents and attention to detail to his homebrew gear. Each was a piece of art -- neat, tidy -- no haywire jobs for him. From time-to-time, I run into some of dad's old friends on the bands. And, I keep in touch with several by email. I know of a couple of active hams that were about a half-generation younger than my dad, and who were mentored and coached by him during their 'formative', novice amateur radio days. They still remember him vividly. Since this web page went 'live', I've heard from a couple more hams from back in those days. But, as time marches on, there will be fewer and fewer around and active that I'll be able to say "Hi!" to and exchange memories of him. What we do today is possible because we are standing on the shoulders of giants. |
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