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By Chuck Crist, W9IH
ARRL Indiana Assistant Section Manager
September 9, 2003
Fun was the apparent result of a successful recipe--a recipe that included lots of preplanning, food, and Ham Radio. At the Indianapolis the Red Cross Chapter house, the Red Cross radio disaster group sponsored its very first Kids Day event.
Amateur Radio operators and club members of the group began setup and testing early the week before January the 6th in order to prepare for the Kids Day on the air event.
Led by Steve Wendt, KB9RDS, hams not only took time to demonstrate Amateur Radio but let the visiting kids spend time on the air talking and working other kids across the USA. The club setup code practice areas for kids and parents to expose them to the Morse Code that Hams use on the air during CW communications.
A log sheet was available for each kid, and Steve had an area for helping the kids fill out their individual sheets in preparation for the contacts they would soon be making.
Steve Wendt, KB9RDS: "OK! This is where we start; these our your radio logs..."
On to the radio room, where club members were ready with five stations in all; one each on 10, 15, and 20 meters, and two on 2 meters. Kids could wonder from station to station and make contacts as the day progressed.
Lots of comments followed throughout the day as kids experienced the fun of chatting with other places and other kids. Here are some of my favorites from the event:
"What's this?"
"So this is Ham Radio!"
"Can I do this too?"
"How do I do this?"
"What's my call sign?"
"Dave, say your name please?" (Oops!) Sarah Brenner, 5, with Merle, KB9PDM
And finally, one 15 year-old kid made a contact with a NASA station and jumped up shouting for all to hear... "I just contacted NASA!!!!!!!"
Over in the code room, kids were amazed to see how easy sending Morse code can be. John, W9GRE, had these notes from the code area:
"Is this my name?"
"This is really cool!"
"This is fun!"
Twenty-four kids made 58 contacts from five stations during the event.
It was concluded that kids do live in Indiana and have fun with Ham radio. The Red Cross Disaster Radio Group plans to do more Kids Day events, where the big kids have fun too.
Special thanks to Bill, K9DBY, John, W9GRE, Rick, KB9NZY, Don, K9MCM, Mike, KB9NZF, Suzy, KB9WRV, and Norm, KB9UEH.
The Indianapolis IN Red Cross Disaster Radio Group's WA9LGQ is located at 441 E. 10th Street, Indianapolis IN 46202
