Lanarkshire Philatelic Society
"Amateur Radio"
Dr. Ron Harkess
It
was a dream night for "Radio
Hams"
at the Lanarkshire Philatelic Society on Friday evening, 2nd October
when our guest
speaker, Dr Ron Harkness, himself a Radio Ham of many years (beginning from
1947), gave his display.
With
many stamps, covers, meter marks, miniature sheets and posters he illustrated
many aspects of the subject. He began from
the discovery and work of the "Radio
Pioneers":-
Stanley Morse; Guglielmo Marconi; Alexander Graham Bell; Stepanovitch
Popoff and Reginald Fessenden. The
International Telecommunication Union in Geneva, Switzerland;
the Radio Societies of Great Britain; the Amateur Radio Convention –
all were well illustrated.
Amateur
Radio has been well used at Scout Jamborees – and contact made with Scouts in
all areas of the world – there were many covers and stamps and miniature
sheets issued to honour these Jamborees. Scouts
were keen to learn the Morse code to enable them to take part.
In
September 1972, many
countries issued stamps etc to mark the 75th Anniversary of
Marconi’s first wireless signals across water – and there were many postal
items from countries celebrating Anniversaries of their Amateur Radio Stations.
One such Station was operated by King Hussein of Jordan who was a keen "Ham"!
In
the second round there was a display of many "Call
Cards"
and also wonderful Covers illustrating:- Bletchley
Park; Orbiting satellites carrying amateur Radio; and the original Marconi
Wireless Telegraph Station on St Kilda.
The
display ended with covers signed by famous people who are/were Radio Hams:-
Rajiv Gandhi; King Hussein; King Juan
Carlos; Yuri Gagarin and Brian Rix – among many others.
The
Vote of Thanks was given by Terry Woods who gave Ron Harkness very warm thanks
for a truly fantastic display.
Our next meeting in the Caledonian Bowling Club, Motherwell Road, Hamilton, is on Friday, 9th October, 2015, at 7:30pm when Club members will give displays on the subject of "European Islands".
Anyone with an interest in stamps, postal history, postcards etc is very
welcome to attend.