80th ARRL Anniversary of North Dakota Radio Amateur

Alex Muggli, W0ZTL, an amateur in North Dakota USA, was recently honored on the 80th anniversary of his ARRL membership, a very rare milestone. At the recent Bismarck Hamfest, Muggli, who still lives in his home town of Glen Ullin, was presented with an 80-year membership plaque and a framed commemorative cover of QST from 1935, the year Muggli joined the ARRL.

“Alex has been a ham since he was 17, and now is 97 years old. His wife had him quit climbing his tower a couple of years ago, but he seems like he could still do it today.”

— ARRL Dakota Division Vice Director Kent Olson, KA0LDG

Nelson said the presentation was a surprise to Alex and his wife, Alice. Their son Dave, N0JLY, and his wife Karen were on hand for the recognition.

Born in 1917, Muggli got interested in radio as a youngster and built a cat’s whisker “crystal set” as his first radio. He learned Morse code in the Boy Scouts — he became an Eagle Scout — and was first licensed as W9ZTL in 1937, a couple of years after he joined the League. He subsequently became W0ZTL, when the FCC reshuffled US call districts. Muggli served in the US Navy during World War II and was a radio and radar instructor. He later worked in his family’s business, managing a grain elevator until he retired.

Muggli remains active on the daily ARRL North Dakota traffic nets and still drives a car. “Many old hams and even the new ones remember Alex on 160 meters,” said Nelson. “He is always active on 160 meters in the winter months and sends out many QSLs. Although Alex is pretty reserved, he is in good health, has lots of stories to tell, and is a special person to visit with at hamfests or on the air,” he added.

PyQSO v0.2 Released

Version 0.2 of PyQSO, a simple contact logging tool that runs on Linux, has been released.

PyQSO is a logging tool for amateur radio operators. It provides a simple graphical interface through which users can manage information about the contacts/QSOs they make with other operators on the air. All information is stored in a light-weight SQL database.

This new release contains a number of fixes and updates to the user interface, and additional features such as an 'insert current date and time' button and the option of specifying default values for the power and mode fields.

Key features include

• Customisable interface (e.g. only show callsign and frequency information).

• Import and export logs in ADIF format.

• Perform callsign lookups and auto-fill data fields using the qrz.com database.

• Sort the logs by individual fields.

• Print a hard-copy of logs, or print to PDF.

• Connect to Telnet-based DX clusters.

• Progress tracker for the DXCC award.

• Grey line plotter.

• Filter out QSOs based on the callsign field (e.g. only display contacts with callsigns beginning with “M6”).

• Remove duplicate QSOs.

• Basic support for the Hamlib library.

PyQSO - http://ctjacobs.github.io/pyqso

PyQSO documentation - http://pyqso.readthedocs.org

Amateur Radio Parity Act of 2015 Introduced in Congress

The Amateur Radio Parity Act of 2015 - H.R.1301 - has been introduced in the US House of Representatives. The measure would direct the FCC to extend its rules relating to reasonable accommodation of Amateur Service communications to private land use restrictions.

US Rep Adam Kinzinger (R-IL) introduced the bill 4-12 March original co-sponsors from both sides of the aisle - seven Republicans and five Democrats. Kinzinger also sponsored "The Amateur Radio Parity Act of 2014, which died at the end of the 113th Congress. H.R. 1301 is an essentially identical piece of legislation.

“The introduction of H.R. 1301 with so many original co-sponsors, so early in this session of Congress, is very encouraging. Several additional members of Congress already have agreed to be co-sponsors. This bill has momentum, but introduction is only the first step. Many of the next steps will be taken as ARRL members contact their US Representatives urging co-sponsorship and thanking them as they sign on to the bill.”

— ARRL President Kay Craigie, N3KN

"The introduction of H.R. 1301 with so many original co-sponsors, so early in this session of Congress, is very encouraging," said ARRL President Kay Craigie, N3KN. "Several additional members of Congress already have agreed to be co-sponsors. This bill has momentum, but introduction is only the first step. Many of the next steps will be taken as ARRL members contact their US Representatives urging co-sponsorship and thanking them as they sign on to the bill."

If Congress approves the legislation, and it is signed by the president, H.R. 1301 would require the FCC to amend its Part 97 Amateur Service rules to apply the three-part test of the PRB-1 federal pre-emption policy to include homeowners' association regulations and deed restrictions, often referred to as "covenants, conditions, and restrictions" (CC&Rs). At present, PRB-1 only applies to state and local zoning laws and ordinances. The FCC has been reluctant to extend the same legal protections to include such private land-use agreements without direction from Congress.

H.R. 1301 has been referred to the House Energy and Commerce Committee. Rep Greg Walden, W7EQI (R-OR), chairs that panel's Communications and Technology Subcommittee, which will consider the measure. The League had worked with Walden on the 2014 bill during the 113th Congress.

Among H.R. 1301 initial co-sponsors is Rep Joe Courtney (D-CT), who attended the ARRL National Centennial Convention last summer to speak with League officials and those attending the event about the earlier bill.

Craigie encouraged ARRL members to urge their US House members to sign on to the bill as a co-sponsor. The ARRL has an H.R. 1301 resources page on its website at, http://www.arrl.org/hr-1301 . If the House member is already a co-sponsor, call the member's local office or send an e-mail via the member's official website to express their thanks.

She called on League members to encourage other hams to do the same, and to be sure to refer to the bill by its number, H.R. 1301.

“Remember what those pile-ups on the W1AW portable stations sounded like last year?”

— ARRL President Kay Craigie, N3KN