W1OCY's hidden treasure

W1OCY, Everett E. Chapman, is a silent key. He died in 2010, just two days shy of the new year at the age of 85. He was born on April 30, 1925 in Glen Cove, NY and grew up in Vermont and New Hampshire.

He served his country in the United States Navy during World War II and was part of the V-12 Navy College Training Program at Dartmouth College. He was at least an Ensign based on items we found in this "treasure." I don't know if he reached any higher ranks, I've tried searching through US Navy Registers online and so far, I haven't found anything.

He graduated from Dartmouth in 1948 with an A.B. and entered the business world in 1955 working for Dynatrol and other places in the aerospace industry such as Raytheon based on his collection of papers we found.

He didn't have much family, didn't marry, at least from what I can tell and obviously no kids. He was survived by brother Donald, who is still alive and will turn 90 on April Fools' Day this year.

He was an Extra-class ham. In fact, his license just expired in May, but hasn't been cancelled because no one has brought his passing to the FCC's attention yet.

And it seems that's how this "treasure" trove of old ham radio equipment and books went undiscovered for nearly 8 years before it was found.

I am member of the North Shore Radio Association, and it appears maybe at one time, so was Mr. Chapman based on a empty binder that was found with a tab labeled North Shore Repeater Association, the club's old name.

Anyways, one of club members, Jim Palmer, KB1KQW, works for Peabody, Massachusetts' public access cable station, Peabody Access Telecommunications/Peabody TV. PAT is based in an old industrial park, known as the Foster St. Complex, located next to the Eastman Gelatine plant.

Jim was asked by the landlord to take a look at stash of old radio equipment found in one of the adjacent buildings.

What was found could be nothing short of "hidden treasure."

W1OCY had tubes galore, old radios that are older than most of us, homebrew equipment and books, books galore. I was told it was on six pallets, but it was managed to get condensed down into four pallets.

I've only taken a brief look at the radios as so far my only night helping (due to my work schedule) was sorting the books.

Everett was an interesting and eclectic ham, suffice to say. He had many, many books on amateur radio and electronics, but also books on the Civil War, military uniforms, military horse saddles, military belt buckles, woodworking, machining, model trains and various types of engines. Not to mention the piles and piles of periodicals such as Science and Mechanics and good ole' Popular Mechanics.

So what do we plan to do with this "treasure"?

Auction it and sell it and raise funds for the club. We plan to list some of the stuff on eBay, we also plan on hitting up the local ham fests and fleas to sell it such as NEAR-Fest and Boxboro, the ARRL New England convention. I suggested the Flea at MIT. Some stuff will probably be bought to Hamcation and Hamvention too.

UPDATE: We've sold some of the items, click here for more information.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

2019 Head of the Charles Regatta

Image
On Saturday, October 19th, 2019 and Sunday, October 20th, 2019, I participated as a volunteer in my first ever Head of the Charles Regatta, I visited the Regatta a few years prior to becoming a ham, but this was my first time being there long term. This was the fifty-fifth edition of the Head of the Charles, which first began in 1965. The Head of the Charles Regatta (HOCR) is the world's largest two day regatta. Outside of the major league team sports and the Boston Marathon, the Head of the Charles is probably one of the biggest sporting events in Boston. To quote rowing coach Susan Saint Sing: Regattas such as the Head of the Charles in Boston and the Head of the Schuylkill in Philadelphia are to the rowing world what the New York Marathon and the Boston Marathon are to running. Myself and two volunteers on a walking team. The job of the amateur radio operators at the HOCR is to be the radio communications for the volunteer first aid teams on shore and on the saf...
Read more

Boston Marathon Amateur Radio Survival Tips

Image
I've participated in the Boston Marathon for the past two years and here's some survival tips for new hams. This is inspired by  W3ATB's original Survival Guide.  (Although it should be noted that the guide has been superseded by newer documentation.) Be prepared As the Scout Motto goes, BE PREPARED . The Boston Marathon is probably the preeminent public service event in all of amateur radio. (My opinion, of course.) Mind you, the course spreads over 26.2 miles from Hopkinton, Massachusetts to Boston, Massachusetts. You need to be prepared in various ways. 1.  Make sure your radio is programmed beforehand. Whether you have a top of the line Kenwood or a bottom of the barrel Baofeng or somewhere in between, make sure it is programmed with the various repeater and simplex frequencies before the event. Make sure you have the offsets and tones correct also. You don't want to be hand punching in frequencies and tones on the front panel at the volunteer meetup...
Read more

TSA's Radio Infrastructure

Image
As I mentioned in one of my earlier posts , I work for TSA, the Transportation Security Administration , the federal agency charged with protecting the nations transportation systems. Today, I'm going to give you a little overview of the agency's two-way radio systems. Sensitive Security Information Before I begin though, I must go over Sensitive Security Information or SSI . SSI is a designation used by TSA which is coded in federal regulation that states that SSI "is information that, if publicly released, would be detrimental to transportation security." SSI is essentially sensitive but unclassified information. As I work for TSA, I am automatically a "covered person" who is required to protect such information. Therefore, I am limited in what I can I use and say on anything that is considered SSI. However, most of the sources I'm using for this blog post are publicly available third-party sources which are not SSI or if it is a TSA source...
Read more