Hello World: A Life in Ham Radio

By Danny Gregory and Paul Sahre

To an outsider, the world of ham radio is one of basement transmitters, clunky microphones, Morse code, and crackly, possibly clandestine, worldwide communications, a world both mysterious and geeky. But the real story is a lot more interesting: indeed, there are more than two million operators worldwide, including people like Walter Cronkite and Priscilla Presley. Gandhi had a ham radio, as do Marlon Brando and Juan Carlos, king of Spain. Hello World takes us on a seventy-year odyssey through the world of ham radio. From 1927 until his death in 2001, operator Jerry Powell transmitted radio signals from his bedroom in Hackensack, New Jersey, touring the worlds most remote locations and communicating with people from Greenland to occupied Japan. Once he made contact with a fellow ham operator, he exchanged postcards known as QSLs cards with them. For seven decades, Powell collected hundreds of these cards, documenting his fascinating career in amateur radio and providing a dazzling graphic inventory of people and places far flung. This book is both an introduction to the fascinating world of ham and a visual feast for anyone interested in the universal language of graphic design.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 156898281X
• ISBN13: 9781568982816
• Release Date: April 2003
• Publisher: Princeton Architectural Press
• Length: 256 Pages
• Weight: 1.70 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.3" x 0.9" x 6.9"
• Age Range: 13 years and up
• Grade Range: Grade 8 to Postsecondary

Customer Reviews

For Design People, Too, Not Just Hams

I know nothing about ham radio and loved this book. It is beautifully constructed, has amazing graphics and a great story that Gregory has reconstructed about one man's passion. It's a book about communication, and humanity, and art and how small the world really is. Gorgeous.

Talking to the World

With the rise of "personal" electronics--think Internet, tiny cell phones & other wireless connection tools--the world of ham radio seems to have been passed by, forgotten, or otherwise relegated to the basement, or worse. But this hobby holds on, fascinating & attracting those wanting more, some means of talking, chatting, meeting & interacting with the world at-large. Who want something besides giant corporations (ultimately concerned only with P & L) & sometime silly can-you-hear-me-now keyboard manipulations. Something beyond the anonymous nature of what we call commercial radio. Hams, by & large, remain a curious lot--curious about how & why radio works. And curious because how is it possible to sit in your room & talk with someone else halfway around the world, without wires or other connections? Curious about the nature of communication itself, about who might be on "the other end" of that circuit. And curious about who & what they might be & do. The process occurs thousands of times, day & night, spanning everything, from continents to cultures to countries to crazy dreams & ideas. There's a romance to it, listening to signals that are all around us, unseen or felt, until we hook up a radio & detect them. Ham radio lets you put your own message out there, into that vast ethereal space, seeking something only you know about, something only you want."Hello World" introduces readers to some of that romance, to some of what kept Jerry Powell (whose collection of QSL cards form the basis of the work) doing it for 70 years. To some of what fascinated him, & continues to fascinate millions of others around the world. It's a graphical treat, & a rare look into radio from the amateur's point of view. Hopefully, some youngster, somewhere, will see it, & want to learn more--about radio, the world, & communicating with it via radio. And Jerry Powell's legacy will live on...and on....

Hello world nice to meet you.

I was utterly unaware of the ham radio community before reading "Hello World". After devouring the book upon it's arrival, I am now totally enamored with both the hams and "Hello World". The book teems with lush images and interesting factoids that let me in on an intriguing and lovable culture.

Delightful!

"Hello World" is a delightful and innovative way to capture the essence of radio communication as practised by the amateur radio operator. The authors bring a graphically creative approach to a topic that can be hard at times to describe to the uninitiated. The biographical sketch of a ham radio operator over a 70 year period of history is accomplished by a truly remarkable portrayal of the post-card size, colorful "QSL" cards he collected - one for each of the personal two-way radio communications he made with people all over the world. This is a great addition to the 100 year history of written works on amateur radio. The only improvement I can imagine would be to publish a coffee-table version in hardback!Bob