MSGID: 1:18/200.0 5e261eaa   
   (There is a really nice video that accompanies this article if you read this   
   at the link listed below. -- Sean)   
      
   From:   
   https://techcrunch.com/2020/01/18/the-last-radio-station/   
      
                                The last radio station   
      
      Chris Gates   
      
      North of Silicon Valley, protected by the Point Reyes National Seashore,   
      is the only operational ship-to-shore maritime radio station. Bearing the   
      call sign KPH, the Point Reyes Station is the last of its kind.   
      
      KPH is divided between two physical stations: one, knows as the voice, is   
      responsible for transmitting; the other half of the station, known as the   
      ears, was where human operators listened for incoming messages. The voice   
      is located 11 miles north of Point Reyes in the small town of Bolinas,   
      Calif., and the ears reside within the Point Reyes National Seashore   
      boundary nestled in pastures full of cattle and backdropped by the Pacific   
      Ocean.   
      
      Stations like this once riddled the California coastline as part of a   
      radio communication network. The operators who ran them were charged with   
      watching over the Pacific Ocean airways, relaying messages to the sailors   
      at sea.   
      
      "These guys and women were the best there were, and they had to be," says   
      Richard Dillman, chief operator at the Maritime Radio Historical Society.   
      "On the ships, you could get away with anything. You could send slow, you   
      could send fast, you could send like you were drunk, you could send like   
      you are beating two spoons together. At the shore side, you had to be able   
      to say, `fine, I got it, you can send fast, no problem. Send slow,   
      I'llwait. Send like you are drunk, I can understand you.' Because every   
      word is revenue for the company because you were charging by the word."   
      
      Dillman, who was never an employee of KPH, but rather a self-described   
      "groupee and radio-obsessed person," says the operators had to adapt to   
      anything. "They were the best there were. They are our heroes and   
      heroines."    
      
      But once satellite communication became cheaper than paying radio   
      operators, telegraphy became obsolete, and the network of radio stations   
      became all but lost, as they were abandoned, sold and scavenged for   
      parts.    
      
      Marin County Congressman Clem Miller saved KPH from this fate by writing   
      and introducing the bill for the establishment of Point Reyes National   
      Seashore. The bill preserved the land from development after operations   
      ended.    
      
      
   A telegraphic timeline   
      
      The communications industry in the U.S. has seen several waves of   
      disruption. The first significant innovation was sending a message by   
      transmitting electrical signals over a wire.   
      
      In 1843, Samuel Morse, the father of Morse code, received funding from   
      Congress to set up and test his new communication wire from Washington,   
      D.C., to Baltimore. Upon completion, he sent the first official telegraph   
      saying, "What hath God wrought." What it wrought was money.   
      
      Morse received enough funding to string wire across an unsettled American   
      landscape. From 1843 to 1900, wired telegraphy reigned until a new   
      technology disrupted the communication monopoly of Western Union.    
      
      On June 2, 1896, Guglielmo Marconi patented a system of wireless   
      telegraphy that would utilize radio waves to transmit Morse's dits and   
      dahs, making wired communication seem infrastructure-heavy. Plus, wireless   
      telegraphy made maritime and transcontinental communication a lot more   
      simple.   
      
      For almost 100 years, Morse code was used to communicate with ships at   
      sea. By 1999 the industry had switched over to the cheaper and more   
      efficient satellite communication systems.   
      
      The Point Reyes KPH station ended operations on June 30, 1997. The last   
      day of U.S. commercial use of Morse code was July 12, 1999. The final   
      message sent was the same as Morse's first: "What hath God wrought."    
      
      
   `This was the end'   
      
      "It's just beeps in the air," says Dillman. "That is all Morse code is.   
      And yet it was so impactful and emotional to these people," he says about   
      the operators and sailors he was with during the last day of Morse.   
      "Because here they are seeing their career, their way of life, their   
      skills disappearing. This was the end of the line. It used to be that you   
      could take your license and telegraph key and move onto the next station,   
      get a job, no problem. This was the end."   
      
      After the last day of Morse in 1999, two years after KPH shut down,   
      Richard and a few other radiomen drove up to the shuttered KPH station to   
      assess how harsh the elements had been in the two years since it closed.   
      
      "Here it was, our life's work, just handed to us," Dillman says. "Because   
      here are the ears, in Point Reyes, still living. The voice in Bolinas -   
      dark and cold, but existing. So all we had to do was convince the park   
      service that [restoring the station] was worth doing, and we were the guys   
      to do it. And we are still amazed that they bought our story, and we have   
      not turned back."    
      
      Dillman and the rest of the radio squirrels that hang around KPH can be   
      found every Sunday and more than welcome visitors.   
      
   Later,   
   Sean   
       
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