My CB shacks through the years, 1971-1984

My CB handle in the early days was Swamp Rat, I was a big fan of drag racing, my favorite drag racer was Don Garlits, he was the man to go faster than 200 mph in a quarter mile, the name of his car was "Swamp Rat".

On 11 meter SSB there were clubs that gave out member numbers that we used like call signs, the one I used the most was from the Southeastern SSB club my call was SE-9111. I also had Wallace Country # WC-1956, Blue Ridge # BR-913 and Carowinds # was CW-402.

My FCC issued call sign was KDU-3325.

In my bedroom when I was still in high school, date on bottom of photo is April '71,

a couple months before finishing school.

That's my Cobra Cam 88 I'm talking on.

I still have the chest the radio is sitting on, the foot stool under my feet and the bookcase holding the model cars, also the 4 speaker speaker column in the corner that my best friend in high school,

Ronnie Whilden made for me, it's hooked up in my ham shack right now.

When Belinda and I got married we lived in a 2 bedroom duplex. I had my "shack" in the other bedroom.

Ronnie Whilden helped me build my radio desk in the corner of the room. This is just before I got my first SSB CB rig. I think that's my Courier mobile hanging under the shelf to the left of the clock.

The National NC-125 to the right of the clock was given to me by Bob Bolin who worked with me at EMCO.

On the very left edge of the photo you can see part of an ARC-2, I sure would like to find this one again. I traded it to a friend several years after this photo was taken.

This photo was taken in our first house, the paneled den I took over for my growing antique radio collection.

On the desk is a Hallicrafters BC-779A receiver, on top is my Bearcat 210 scanner and Sears Roadtalker 40 SSB rig.

This photo was taken sometime around 1980.

This photo was taken in the same house as the photo above, but in the other bed room that I eventually had to move into since my radio collection had grown such that there was no longer room in the paneled den for my "shack".

This was sometime around 1983, note the Vic 20 personal computer. On the right side of the desk is a HeathKit SB-300 Shortwave receiver. This receiver was the same styling as the other SB line amateur gear except that this one is set up for receiving the shortwave broadcast bands not amateur radio bands. I wish I still had it, I've since learned that they're fairly rare.

On the gray metal shelves to the left of the desk is a Realistic

TRC-459 microprocessor controlled 40 channel SSB CB radio. It has memories and it can be set to scan. a really neat radio.

This is the start of it all. I got a pair of CB walkie talkies for xmas in 1963 if I remember correctly. Of course they were only 100mw and on one channel, which was 11.

That's me sitting at the table which I guess became my first work bench. It was an old kitchen table I found on the attic. The young man standing is Steve Horn, he was my best friend, that's his sister Carol peeking around the edge of the photo.

They lived next door. I gave Steve one of the WTs so we could talk from house to house. About 7 years later I got the Cam 88 in the photo below.

Below on the left are the QSL cards that I made about this time. The one above in pencil was done by a guy that worked with my mom, the one below is my final version that I had printed. On the right is a needlepoint that my mother did of my Swamp Rat drawing.