Brer Ed Vance wrote to Brer Roy Witt about Re: Resurrected:   
      
    RW>>> My 2nd Elmer was a friend of a friend, who gave me the   
    RW>>> incentive to take the test for a Novice ticket, c1970 - WN6ABE   
    RW>>> was a one year license with no renewal available, per FCC rules   
    RW>>> at the time.   
      
    EV>> Brer Roy,   
      
    EV>> My Novice License had the same One Year rule.   
      
    RW>> Did you upgrade before the one year expiration or did you skip   
    RW>> the upgrade and wait intil later to do that.   
      
    EV> Brer Roy,   
      
    EV> I passed the Technician Test at Dayton Hamvention in May, one month   
    EV> before my Novice license would expire.   
    EV> I can't remember when the General License arrived that summer,   
    EV> wheather it came before or after the Novice Ticket would have   
    EV> expired.   
      
   Hmmm. I let my Novice ticket expire because I lost interest. I was too   
   busy being single and romancing the ladies. I had borrowed a pair of Drake   
   twins and returned those within a few months, never having fired them up.   
      
    EV> ----snip----   
      
    RW>> An aside to your story, while I and a close friend were sitting   
    RW>> in the FCC's exam room at their offices in San Diego c1978, we   
    RW>> were taking the General code exam. The code test included a 10   
    RW>> question test that asked about the content of the code that we   
    RW>> had copied. One question stands out in my mind as 'the question   
    RW>> that broke the camel's back'... The question was; how many   
    RW>> watts did the sender say he was using?   
      
    EV> The Code Tests I took in the late 1950's wasn't of the Q&A Type.   
      
   I think the FCC updated the tests to stimulate your brain, making sure   
   that you knew the content of the session, rather than finding a number of   
   characters copied correctly in a row.   
      
    EV> Back then to pass the CW Exam IIRC 65 characters straight had to   
    EV> be written on the paper.   
      
   6as5d4d54as65das5d4fad65d4fa5s44f34sd534asf4sdf44s5df454f5s3sa4f   
      
   But, what did it say?   
      
    EV> When I took the Amateur Extra Test it was a Q&A Test.   
    EV> I passed the CW but failed the Written Part, and walked out of the   
    EV> room with a Temporary Amateur Advanced License.   
      
   I really never aspired to have a EXTRA class license, since there's no   
   advantage to having one if you're not at all interested in using CW ...   
   The only advantage I've found is that you could get a 1x2 or 2x1 call   
   sign, but then after running out of those, they began to issue 2x2 calls,   
   which I already had with my Advanced call - KB6PI...   
      
    EV> I only tried for the Extra because of someone who I felt was a bigger   
    EV> LID than I am was always on the air bragging about his being an   
    EV> Extra.   
      
   I ignore those kind of people. In SD we had a person who not only had an   
   Amateur license, he also owned a commercial mountain top where he had   
   built facilities to house commercial radio and TV services and Amateur   
   radio was a second thought, but in his kindness, he leased space to a   
   local HAM 2mtr club. I had a repeater on the tallest mtn top, but it   
   wasn't owned by that guy, who spent hours on the HAM clubs repeater,   
   giving his 'love me' speal over the lease and bad-mouthing the repeater   
   users.   
      
    EV> -------snip---   
      
    RW>> Another friend, sitting across the room from us failed that   
    RW>> test (his 5th try) and hadn't gotten past Technician before I   
    RW>> moved to Texas in 2004. When the code test was no longer   
    RW>> required, I see that he has made it to Extra Class. I have no   
    RW>> idea why, as he kept his old WB6xxx call sign and can't   
    RW>> communicate in CW...   
      
    EV> Before the FCC allowed Hams to keep their Call Sign no matter where   
    EV> they lived, I kept my K4 call from Kentucky and because I had moved   
    EV> to Indiana I got a Secondary License with a WA9 call.   
      
   Those were no longer available when I got licensed. I often wondered why   
   anyone would need two calls.   
      
    EV> When my folks moved from the QTH my K4 license showed I asked the FCC   
    EV> to Cancel that License and make the WA9 call my Primary License.   
      
   Hmmm.   
      
    EV> In the 1970's or 1980's when I learned that I could exchange my WA9   
    EV> license for a One by Three license without paying anything, I asked   
    EV> the FCC for a 1X3 Call Sign figuring I'd get a K9 call and they gave   
    EV> me the W9 call I have now.   
      
   Beginning in the 90s sometime, they began to issue 'vanity' calls of your   
   choice. This is how I got licensed as K6RXT and a few years after I moved   
   to Texas, K5RXT was available, so I applied for that one and got it. The   
   former licensee lived in Louisiana and went silent key.   
      
      
            R\%/itt - K5RXT   
      
   "It is the fault of our science that it wants to explain all, and   
    if it explain not, then it says there is nothing to explain."   
        Bram Stoker (1847-1912)   
      
    Thus, we have "Climate Change Science" - which isn't capable of   
    explaining anything.   
      
      
   --- GoldED+/W32 1.1.5-31012   
   --- D'Bridge 3.98   
    * Origin: South-Texas Area Hub - Gulf Coast Backbone (1:387/22)