Women On The Airwaves
I didn’t have a sister, only had a brother two years older and six inches taller than me. The taller was notable to me because for some unknown reason my parents bought boxing gloves for us. Neither of us was overly interested in the pugilistic pursuits but occasionally we would don the gloves and go at it. The result was usually the same. My brother would hold me off at arm’s length and use his other hand to pound me on top of the head as my gloves futilely swung at air. The resulting headaches may have been the portent for some of my quirks today.
Geri the neighbor girl three houses down the street was one year older than me and one year younger than my brother Kerry. Geri was one year older than me in age but she was YEARS ahead of me in maturity. She and I got along very well and I considered her my “sister”. Looking back with the clarity of many years passing, I have trouble understanding why she put up with me. By the time I was in high school I was passably acceptable as a teenager and Geri continued to provide me with “big sister” advice and counsel. Such was the majority of my early education about females.
First of all,I think if I’m trying to help more women get on the air I should ask them, “What keeps you from keying the microphone and getting on the air? How can we help you? What can local amateurs do to help?”
I provide this family background so the reader does not think I have any special insight into the female gender of our species. I have successfully worked with, supervised, taught, socialized with and attempted to advise women during my lifetime. I should not have included advising in the success column but I did use the word “attempted” in that statement.
I have found women to have some of the finest brains and minds I have associated with. Some of the female troops under my command were among my best soldiers. Bright, tenacious, capable and self-sufficient are all adjectives describing many women. So why don’t we hear more of them on the airwaves? I read a statistic that 15% of amateur radio licenses are held by females. I do not hear 15% of the QSO’s having female voices and viewpoints. Obviously there is some interest or they would not have pursued getting licensed.
Here are a few names amateurs should check out: Jeri Ellsworth AI6TK, Ria Jairam N2RJ, Cat Scogins W4DXY, Mary Domaleski KI4HHI and Rasia R1BIG (Russian) and OH7BG (Finland). Each one of these amateurs has a special story and each one is contributing to the hobby of amateur radio.
Jeri Ellsworth is: a ham, race car builder and driver, entrepreneur, inventor, computer developer and a free spirit. She grew up in the Monmouth / Independence area and would ride her bike over to the ham fests held at the Rickreal fair grounds and pick up equipment that was left behind by exhibitors. She learned from playing and tinkering with the equipment. She is self-taught having dropped out of school. She learned computer programming and developed video games one of which sold millions of units. She went to a ham fest and passed all three tests in one sitting. Obviously she is an extraordinary person with an extraordinary brain. She sees a challenge and works to solve it by herself.
Rasia is a Russia YL who operates out of Russia, Finland and Canada, the some times remotely. She is enthusiastic and even learned Japanese phrases to respond to Japanese operators for contesting. Rasia produces many interesting videos and tries to bring people to the hobby, especially women. She can’t operate out of her home 27th floor apartment in St. Petersburg. Russia so she does a lot of her radio work outdoors or with another amateur’s station (i.e. Finland and the remote station in Canada)
Ria comes from the Dominican Republic and is now an American citizen, an Electrical Engineer, a mother, was an ARRL Director for a number of years. She creates a very interesting web page “Ria’s Shack” and is an advocate for women in amateur radio. Ria wrote a Technician Class study series and checked with the ARRL if there was any “conflict of interest” as she was a Director on the Board. They gave her permission to publish the series and later rescinded permission and used her actions as a reason to remove her from the board.
Perhaps the Lincoln County Amateur Radio Club can do something to help improve female participation and membership. I have talked about a class that would be on the subject “I Have My License, Now What?”. I need to quit talking and create the class. If you have any ideas which would help with this, please contact me.
Some ideas would be a regular class but could be a breakout at a Club meeting or during Field Day. Perhaps a zoom session like Daron’s Wilson’s Wednesday Workshop. Subjects could range from setting up a simple station to putting up an antenna or “what do I say on the air”. One ham told me that making contacts on the air with his computer keyboard gave him experience and confidence to pick up the microphone and have a verbal QSO.
One of the major frightening aspects seems to be “making mistakes while I’m talking on the radio”. I think that the fact that there is no facial “feedback” can be a factor. Maybe what you say will seem strange, silly or wrong to the receiving station. OK. Everyone has to start somewhere and everyone has made and will make mistakes. One can say, “oops” or “so what? You’ll likely never see nor talk with the person again and if they can’t overlook your mistake … perhaps that is for the better.” I have seldom had a QSO with the same person (other than local hams) multiple times and if it was not for my computerized logbook I wouldn’t know that we had a QSO in January of 2020 let alone know what was said.
I talked with one ham who had multiple scripts that he used during his first few months on the air. Many hams seem to be obsessed with the weather. “It’s sunny and warm here on the Oregon coast, we are 78 degrees and no wind. How is the weather in the Himalayan mountains?” Is it an obsession or just a interesting comment that almost anyone can relate to?
Others will discuss their station. This can lead to common and not so common ground. “I’m running a Flex 6500 through a 1,000 watt amplifier to a StepIR beam on a 150 foot mast.” Which can bring up many comments such as “Wow you must really be rich.” “I’ve always been interested in the Flex radios, are they hard to set up?” “I had a Flex radio but I didn’t like it as it had no knobs to fiddle with.” Or it might bring a comment like, “Well I’m running 100 watts and a wire 30 feet off the ground.”
QSOs, like life can be good, bad, interesting or boring (you might ask yourself is this guy ever going to stop talking?) And with that comment, I will take the hint and “stop talking”.
73
Chuck Gerttula
W7CRG
orefinn@yahoo.com