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Violate Radio Law - WA1TRY - 03-02-2022
Today we have "instant gratification" afforded to us thanks to high speed internet and the ever growing presence of "social media". I have to note that healthy debate along with the occasional rant or discord are not unique to OUR current history.
Back in the early days of radio in Meriden, we had plenty of discussions regarding the "new" wireless technology and it's issues. Those published "discussions" back then just took a lot longer to get around as commerical radio had not yet been developed and our only means of getting information was from printed sources.
Historically speaking, you can say that the printed Newspapers' "Letters to the Editor" columns were the fore-runners of Facebook and Twitter. In our previous thread here we looked at an article posted by an anonymous young? Radio enthusiast who was asking in one of those columns, "Why Not A Radio Club? ". The following is an excerpt from a reply posted a few days later. In it a Meriden resident and radio hobbist had this to say.
The "Radio Bug" has the right idea in some subjects, but he fails to mention one of the most important of all the grievances of the wireless hobbyists.. That grievance is the trouble a number of thoughtless amateurs make by setting upon a spark coil, and the necessary equipment, and chattering away in a vain attempt to transmit a message to some distant friend. Although every radio enthusiast has a perfect right to own and operate a receiving set witrhout a license, it is absolutely against the federal law to transmit a wireless message or even have a transmitting set ready to operate, unless it is duly licensed. A radio inspector is continually on the lookout for violations of the law along those lines, and is in authority to tear down the set of any offender. Many enthusiastic operators are undoubtedly ignorant of the law regulating the radio traffic, and are violating it innocently altough. In the interests of lovers of the hobby, some step should be taken to curb the efforts of these operatiors who are not aware of the law or are unwilling to comply with it.
Yours in the interests of a better radio sportsmanship, Harold Bodwell.
Yes in our city of Meriden, opinions and debate about "radio hams" were often topics in the newspapers in 1921.
If interested you can download the full article as scanned from the Jan 15th 1921 issue of the Meriden Daily Journal.
(the file when viewed is small to save a few bytes, but is of good enough resolution to blow up to read easier in your viewer)