NEXT MEETING: FRIDAY March 31, 2023
6:00 PM Board Meeting (all are welcome to attend and observe)
7:00 PM Refreshments and Socializing
7:30 PM Membership Meeting Followed by Program
Entrance to CDH for our meeting
Meetings are held at Cretin-Derham Hall High School located at the intersection of
Hamline and Randolph in St. Paul. Park in the lot off Hamline near the athletic field.
Enter door 21 at the Ryan STEM Center addition. The meeting room is down the hallway
on the right (the Commons). Door 21 will lock at 7:45 so if you arrive after that, please
call me at 612-201-0818 to be let in. Br. Bob.
Program
Our meetings are hybrid meetings. That means there will be an in-person meeting at
Cretin-Derham Hall (CDH) and a meeting on Zoom for those unable to attend in person.
Zoom meeting information can be found at the end of the newsletter.
The April Program will be presented by Don Kelly (WA6ZMT) will fill us in on two
significant activities that our members and our club may be interested in this year. As
you may have read in QST, 2023 is ARRL’s “Year of the Volunteer” recognizing the
contributions of the volunteers who far outnumber ARRL staff. A year-long event,
“Volunteers on the Air” (VOTA) is underway involving contacts between ARRL members
and ARRL volunteers and between hams and W1AW portable stations in every US state
and some territories. Every ARRL member and club has an opportunity to “be” W1AW
during this event.
Also, planning is underway to have an ARRL Section Convention in Minneapolis on
October 14th. Don will talk about opportunities for SPRC and its members to support the
event and, of course, for its members to attend the event.
1
Don Kelly was talked into becoming a ham by friends at Indiana University in 1962.
Inability to get past 5wpm of CW limited him to Novice and Tech licenses until the code
requirement was dropped and General was a possibility; he upgraded to Extra a couple
years ago so he would never need to take another test. Don has been an active SPRC
member since 2005 “retiring” last spring as Past President. An ARRL Life Member since
1962, he recently accepted the responsibility of ARRL Affiliated Club Coordinator for the
Minnesota Section.