The purpose of this web page is to give the reader an image of some of the hobbies I have.
I have several different hobbies. The ones that interest me the most are radios, computers and photography. I spend many hours of my spare time doing one of those three things. I have an Advanced Class Operators License for amateur radio. I spend lots of time talking over the air to people from all over the world. My favorite band is two meters. You meet a lot of local hams from the southern California area. I have made contacts from as far north as Sacramento, as far south as Mexico, Arizona on the east and Hawaii on the west while working the two meter band..
On the high frequency band, I have made many world-wide contacts. I have talked to five continents. That includes North America, South America, Europe, Asia, and Australia. I have worked many countries within those continents. I have been license for about five years now. You must take and pass several tests with the FCC in order to get an advance class license. Currently, I am working on my General Radiotelephone Operator License. You must pass two written tests with the FCC. The tests consist of about 100 questions out of a pool of 1000. The license is good for life. The amateur license is only good for 10 years. Then you must renew it.
Another hobby of mine is computers. I own four IBM compatible computers which are all networked together. They are either 486's or Pentiums. As a hobby, I build my own computers. I am currently working on another Pentium. I use several input devices for the computer, such as scanners, camcorders, digital cameras and television. Today, digital technology has expanded so much that almost every electronic device can interface with the computer. I use many software programs for my various projects.
I also like cameras. I spend a lot of my spare time going to different places to take pictures. I like taking pictures of the outdoors and things that look natural to me. I have several cameras that I use for different photos. My favorite camera is my Olympus Advanced Photo System. It is a real nice camera and it takes some real nice pictures. Currently, I am working to incorporate some of my photos into this web site. It sounds easier than it is.
Still another interest of mine is education. I am a very curious person. I spend lots of time investigating new ideas. I like to experiment with different things in the electronic field. I have made several little inventions with antennas. I spend lots of time researching different ideas that come across either at home or work
My students love it when we do electronic experiments. They love working with wires, conductors, circuits, batteries and other things. We do many activities involving electronics. I hope to bring you some of the photos from a few of our experiment. Below are some photos of my nephew, Malcolm, my computer, my radio station and myself. Later this month I plan to change some of these photos. The photos were taken with a camcorder.
Many inner-city children are not exposed to many of the more fun hobbies. I try to give them some basic understanding of these things. Look at my professional page to see some of my students. You can reach it by clicking on my call sign, KD6RUH.
Amateur radio is mostly about fostering goodwill toward all races and nationalities. It is an excellent hobby for building communication skills. I think it is a good hobby for all ages. I have worked hams as young as 8 and as old as 98. They come in all shapes, colors, sexes and sizes. Some of the older hams said that they liked working CW instead of voice because of the race problems that existed. There are still some problems with race and ethnicity. Generally, most guys from differerent ethnic, socio-economic or race groups hang together. You'll find ham radio to be like a community of operators. I enjoy it and I think you will too.
I have included some links to other ham's web pages. I plan to continually add more hams to my page as there pages become available to me. The frequencies you can generally hear me on are 144.200mhz, 144.430mhz, 223.500mhz, 446.000mhz, 28.450mhz, 18.150mhz, 14.295mhz, 3.908mhz and some others. Thanks for stopping by and I'll be looking to hear from you. E-mail me and let's talk.
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Last Updated June 26, 1997 by E. Leroy Jones