# CQ de GBSS Hope all well in these Covid times



## GBSS (Nov 18, 2020)

I hope to post a remembrance tomorrow on here of a message the I used to receive annually from WNY just after midnight on 15 April... 

Cheers 

Dave


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## trotterdotpom (Apr 29, 2005)

I forget, was GBSS "Queen Mary" or "Queen Elizabeth"?

John T


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## GBSS (Nov 18, 2020)

trotterdotpom said:


> I forget, was GBSS "Queen Mary" or "Queen Elizabeth"?
> 
> John T


Hi John, GBSS was Queen Elizabeth and GBTT the Queen Mary (I served as a Radio Officer on both in early 60's) Cheers


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## rustytrawler (Jul 6, 2021)

GBSS said:


> I hope to post a remembrance tomorrow on here of a message the I used to receive annually from WNY just after midnight on 15 April...
> 
> Cheers
> 
> Dave


Who or what is WNY thanks, rustytrawler


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## GBSS (Nov 18, 2020)

WNY was the callsign for New York ..


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## trotterdotpom (Apr 29, 2005)

GBSS said:


> Hi John, GBSS was Queen Elizabeth and GBTT the Queen Mary (I served as a Radio Officer on both in early 60's) Cheers


I was a keeper on Nab Tower Lighthouse in Spithead when Queen Mary booked our DF Beacon for a DF Calibration swing. Think it was about 1967. It was a nice sunny day and everyone was out on deck for a look. If you were there, maybe you saw me waving. Hope the swing went OK - I've done a couple myself since then with sketchy results. I mentioned this somewhere else recently, hope it wasn't to you. DF Id may or may not have been NB.

John T


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## trotterdotpom (Apr 29, 2005)

trotterdotpom said:


> I was a keeper on Nab Tower Lighthouse in Spithead when Queen Mary booked our DF Beacon for a DF Calibration swing. Think it was about 1967. It was a nice sunny day and everyone was out on deck for a look. If you were there, maybe you saw me waving. Hope the swing went OK - I've done a couple myself since then with sketchy results. I mentioned this somewhere else recently, hope it wasn't to you. DF Id may or may not have been NB.
> 
> John T


Forgot to mention, this was Queen Mary's departure on her last liner service from Southampton to New York.

John T


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## GBSS (Nov 18, 2020)

Hi John, 
Ah, no sorry. I had left the MN by then and was already in New Delhi, India on my first UK Foreign Service posting. I do however recall doing DF Calibration with the Nab Tower Lighthouse on the QE end of '63/early '64. Good days. 

Cheers


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## gordonarfur (May 27, 2018)

GBSS said:


> WNY was the callsign for New York ..


Surely it was WCC or WSL?


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## majoco (Oct 15, 2008)

There were three NY stations owned by different companies, ITT, RCA and another I don't remember. I'm not saying that there were any 'inducements' to use a specific station but I got a big bollocking
from my chief RO when he found that I had sent an Msg through WCC instead of WSL despite being told by the Mate that this was to go ASAP. WSL's wait list was very long and WCC 's was none.


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## GBSS (Nov 18, 2020)

As Martin said, there were three NY nations owned by different companies. ALL three broadcast the same message ... 
VA


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## trotterdotpom (Apr 29, 2005)

gordonarfur said:


> Surely it was WCC or WSL?


WCC was Chatham and I'm pretty sure WSL was Slidell, way down among the bayous near New Orleans.
John T


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## gordonarfur (May 27, 2018)

trotterdotpom said:


> WCC was Chatham and I'm pretty sure WSL was Slidell, way down among the bayous near New Orleans.
> John T


Never, WSL was in competitionj with WCC and an alternative when WCC was busy.


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## jimg0nxx (Sep 1, 2005)

Slidell WNU was the station for New Orleans and was I think owned by Tropical Radio. When I sailed with Fyffes this was the main station we used. This and I think WAX were part of the same company which owned United Brands/United Fruit/Fyffes and even although the ship was Marconi we were expected to use Tropical Radio stations. A long time ago so a bit vague on the details.


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## rustytrawler (Jul 6, 2021)

Hi jim i see you worked for FYFFES, did you know a man called JACK BOAR he was from your part of the world and worked for FYFFES, he died three weeks ago. regards rustytrawler


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## jimg0nxx (Sep 1, 2005)

Hi Rusty, sorry I did not know Jack, sorry to hear of his passing. I only did one spell with Fyffes. As a Marconi R/O I sailed with umpteen different shipping companies.
Rgds, Jim


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## trotterdotpom (Apr 29, 2005)

gordonarfur said:


> Never, WSL was in competitionj with WCC and an alternative when WCC was busy.


Correctomundo, Gordon. It just came to me that "WSL" was Amagansett, I must have been getting confused by the "SL". James down below has just reminded us that Slidell was "WNU". Slurp.

John T


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## trotterdotpom (Apr 29, 2005)

jimg0nxx said:


> Slidell WNU was the station for New Orleans and was I think owned by Tropical Radio. When I sailed with Fyffes this was the main station we used. This and I think WAX were part of the same company which owned United Brands/United Fruit/Fyffes and even although the ship was Marconi we were expected to use Tropical Radio stations. A long time ago so a bit vague on the details.


I joined Ffyffes' "Morant" in Genoa and relieved an elderly American RO who formerly worked at a United fruit radio station in Florida (can't remember the callsign, probably Miami somewhere). They picked him up when the RO on board was arrested for some smuggling caper and they couldn't get a replacement. The trouble was he hadn't been to sea since WW2 and didn't have a clue how to use the equipment. He managed to get the emergency transmitter going and sent some messages through Gibraltar when they got into range but prior to that they were incommunicado all the way across the Atlantic. He'd been told he would be paid off in Genoa and promised a European holiday afterwards but in Genoa they couldn't get a relief so they told him he had to stay onboard. In response to that he went to the British Consulate in Genoa and dobbed himself in as an American citizen with an expired ticket and therefore not allowed to sail on a British ship. That's when I came on the scene (Freelance) - think I got the job through the union. Wish I'd known the story before I joined, I have put the rates up!

John T


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## jimg0nxx (Sep 1, 2005)

Hi John,
Found the following(somewhat incomplete) information.

Tropical* Radio* & Telegraph used to own* station* WNU in Slidell and* stations* WOE and* WAX* in Florida. WNU eventually took over some of the CW frequencies used by KLC in Galveston.

Jim


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## trotterdotpom (Apr 29, 2005)

jimg0nxx said:


> Hi John,
> Found the following(somewhat incomplete) information.
> 
> Tropical* Radio* & Telegraph used to own* station* WNU in Slidell and* stations* WOE and* WAX* in Florida. WNU eventually took over some of the CW frequencies used by KLC in Galveston.
> ...


Yeeeah. WOE - Lantana Radio. It's a trip down Memory Lane (c/s MLN). Can't remember the proper name of WAX.

John T
PS Whatever you do, don't plant lantana - it'll take over and one day they'll find it overgrowing your body.


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## david.hopcroft (Jun 29, 2005)

WAX - Ojus According to the 1963 Dickey D'Appel
The 1960 Map of Coast Stations lists just north of Miami Ojus Radio (WAX, WOM)

David

+


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## gordonarfur (May 27, 2018)

trotterdotpom said:


> I joined Ffyffes' "Morant" in Genoa and relieved an elderly American RO who formerly worked at a United fruit radio station in Florida (can't remember the callsign, probably Miami somewhere). They picked him up when the RO on board was arrested for some smuggling caper and they couldn't get a replacement. The trouble was he hadn't been to sea since WW2 and didn't have a clue how to use the equipment. He managed to get the emergency transmitter going and sent some messages through Gibraltar when they got into range but prior to that they were incommunicado all the way across the Atlantic. He'd been told he would be paid off in Genoa and promised a European holiday afterwards but in Genoa they couldn't get a relief so they told him he had to stay onboard. In response to that he went to the British Consulate in Genoa and dobbed himself in as an American citizen with an expired ticket and therefore not allowed to sail on a British ship. That's when I came on the scene (Freelance) - think I got the job through the union. Wish I'd known the story before I joined, I have put the rates up!
> 
> John T


John you were quite correct WSL was amagansett I could,nt remember its name must be getting old. Gordon


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## djringjr (Feb 11, 2008)

GBSS said:


> As Martin said, there were three NY nations owned by different companies. ALL three broadcast the same message ...
> VA


I don't recall a third station for New York, but there were two stations in the harbor, WNY run by RCA (sister station to WCC in Chatham, Massachusetts was the first to close) and WSF run by ITT/MACKAY sister station to WSL Amagansett, NY Radio on the southern shore of Long Island which closed around 1976 when the staff was laid off and according to the recollections of Wendell Benson who worked there and the transmitters were remote controlled from the WSL South Hampton, Long Island receiver location were the operators were who used the WSL call on 500 kHz. However WSF was one of the few coastal stations that was authorized to run modulated CW on 500 kHz (and perhaps on its working frequency of 442 kHz) and I never remembered hearing WSL with any tone on 500 kHz so maybe the receivers alone were remoted to WSL. There's no one still alive that I can remember who might know as Wendell Benson passed away about 2007, he was in his last years the Membership Secretary of the Veteran Wireless Operators Association VWOA Welcome Page. There is an existing recording of the last eastbound voyage of QUEEN MARY/GBTT in 1967 that has on it a lovely recording of WSF you can listen here: 



 The entire recording from the beginning is here: 



 You can hear WSL, WSC, WCC, again or for the very first time.

Other videos of mine are here: https://www.youtube.com/user/djringjr

I have more audio recordings of coastal radio stations on the Internet Archive here:
http://tiny.cc/n1ea I hope you enjoy them.

73
DR


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## djringjr (Feb 11, 2008)

GBSS said:


> I hope to post a remembrance tomorrow on here of a message the I used to receive annually from WNY just after midnight on 15 April...
> 
> Cheers
> 
> Dave


Dave,

I don't find the message of one you used to receive annually from RCA's NY Harbor Coastal Radio Station, WNY. Was it posted? 

You're not the only one who loved hearing WNY, when I worked for American Heavy Lift Shipping Company, on SS KING/WAKL, the radio officer of sister ship, SS SPRAY/KEJD and fellow member of Veteran Wireless Operators Association, R/O Gordon White, AA2QZ worked at WNY told me that often when he was on watch at WNY (I believe the station was located at 75 Varick Street, where RCA Service Company was also located.) RCA President David Sarnoff when he was visiting the WNY building would rest by leaning on the wall outside the receiver room of WNY and just listen to the ship traffic on 500 kHz, Mr. Sarnoff was a former radiotelegrapher and was involved with American Marconi joining in 1906, the forerunner of Radio Corporation of America (RCA) the company of which he was then President. WNY was on the roof of 75 Varick Street, and had transmitters and receivers for 500 kHz and 6 MHz according to Ben Russell, N6SL, (SK) past president of the Society of Wireless Pioneers. There is also some interesting information in RCA News Vol. 3 about WNY. Search results for WNY HERE. Click on READ HERE or download the PDF to read on your computer.

73

DR


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