Amateur Radio

Field Day 1998:

This page is mostly pictures, but for background of Field Day, I will try to give a brief explanation of the event. Field Day is held once a year on a weekend (Sat. thru Sun.) usually the 3rd weekend in June. This is an excercise of preparedness along with it being a contest. The main idea is to see if and how well one can cope with an emergency, to get as much done in as little time as possible with everything working efficiently...or at least near that mark. This is generally thought of as going without commercial main power. In other words using batteries, generators, or natural sources of power (because in an emergency, power is sometimes lost indefinately). This, combined with the contesting part, which deals with seeing how many contacts one can make worldwide, gives the overall idea of how fast and how well your station can be brought on line and working. There are many classes ranging from home base setups to field setups essentially "backpacked" in.
It is also a time to gather "hams" together preferably in a public place to promote the hobby. Displays can be set up, with people from the Red Cross and School radio groups organized together. This year...1998, was held in a centralized park here in town. We set up on Saturday, and tore down on Sunday. We had a pavillion rented for open air stations, and some hams, myself included, brought our campers/tents and worked the contest from there. Antennas of different designs were used...this antenna raising time drew lots of attention and weird looks. This was field day in a nutshell. Look at the pics...some say it all.

The pics are numbered and explained below.