MEETING TO ORDER:

     President Jeff KSØJD called to order the August, 2023, business meeting of the SFTARC at 07:47 AM CDT. A total of 18 members attended, 17 joining in person at the Gardner Perkins and 1 joining via Zoom. (Quorum is 13.) There was one guest.

SECRETARY-TREASURER REPORT: 

     Marty KEØPEZ reported the current bank balance and reported the one significant transaction that took place during the past month. The club remains financially sound.

Repeater Update [Jim - KØNK]

     Jim continues to communicate with the City of Olathe and Olathe Health. One of the officials at Olathe Health is a licensed amateur.

HOLLENBERG PONY EXPRESS FESTIVAL [Jim - KØNK]

     This annual event will be held August 27 in Hanover, KS. It will include a simulated old-west telegraph office with an amateur radio station operating as a POTA station.

EnsorFEST 23 Special Event

     "Ensorfest 23 -- Celebrating 100 years of Amateur Radio on the Ensor Farm" will be held today. The planning team has done a good job and the weather looks good. 

CERT TRAINING Event

     Joe Howe described an opportunity for people to take a CERT Training course to be conducted in Edgerton. It starts September 7 and runs for 8 weeks. Please contact jshaw@fd1org to sign up for the course.

KANSAS QSO PARTY

     The 2023 event will be much like prior years, with many club members gathering at the Sawyer Antenna Facility in Edgerton. Distributed operation is allowed, but please sign up for a slot to avoid two stations using the club call on the same band and mode at the same time. Contact one of the club officers or see the club calendar event to get the sign-up link. Larry KDØRIU and Eric KJØD will be operating out of the club trailer on the grounds of the Ensor Park and Museum. They will operate both KSØKS and WØE for the event.

OTHER BUSINESS:

     We will not have a Tech Night program in August.

ADJOURN:

     After a motion to adjourn and a unanimous vote, President Jeff adjourned the meeting at 08:05 CDT.

     Everyone loves a party - right? - and a party in the form of the annual Kansas QSO Party (KQP) will give members of SFTARC a chance to come to the so-called Sawyer Memorial Antenna Farm in Edgerton the weekend of Saturday, August 26 and Sunday, August 27.

     The schedule for the 2023 Kansas QSO Party calls for on-the-air operations to begin at 9 a.m. on the 26th and continue until 9 p.m. that day. More of the same is planned for the 27th, but the final portion of the party will be an abbreviated one, as the search for contacts far and wide will start at 9 a.m. and conclude just six hours later at 3 p.m.

     Check out the club calendar for additional event instructions and a link to the signup sheet:

https://sftarc.org/index.php/calendar-jevent/eventdetail/113/-/kansas-qso-party-day-1

     Operators and loggers are needed, so those who have a little time on their hands are encouraged to drop by Del Sawyer's vintage camper - party attire not required but always welcome - and do what they can to put the spotlight of attention on Kansas.

     For event rules see the Kansas QSO Party Web Site: https://ksqsoparty.org/

Lee Ward Tunes the New Transceiver in the Radio Room

     Several members of the club assembled at Ensor Park and Museum the morning of July 29 to meet Lee Ward of Peculiar, Mo., KØLW, as he arrived with a new Icom 7300 that has been donated for use at the historic eight-acre site owned and operated by the City of Olathe. Ward, who subsequently tuned the transceiver in the Radio Room, told Jeff Darby, KSØJD, club president, Marty Peters, KEØPEZ, secretary-treasurer, Joe Krout, KRØUT, president of The Olathe Ensor Foundation, Howard Cripe, NØAZ, vice president, and Peg Nichols, KDØVQO, that the transceiver was purchased from the company at a nice discount and that "an angel donor" had picked up the tab.

     Rick Parent of Overland Park, WØZAP, also was on hand for the presentation and official "unveiling" of the Icom 7300.

     From the perspective of the club, Ward's timing was excellent, as Ensorest 23 was just two weeks away at that point. Plans for this special event celebrating 100 years of amateur radio on the Ensor Farm call for hams to operate the station in the Radio Room for several hours using Marshall Ensor's signature call sign of W9BSP.  

    It was 90 years ago this month that Marshall Ensor, W9BSP, accompanied by his wife Ina and his sister Loretta, W9UA, returned to the Olathe area following a 43-day trip that covered 5,335 miles and took this ambitious trio north of the border into Canada. The summertime adventure was one of several such pre-World War II adventures that are documented by way of an old map that hangs on the south wall of the Peg Barn at Ensor Park and Museum, next to which is a photograph of Marshall and the car that made all of this traveling possible.

     The journey began July 6 and ended August 18. Cities visited along the way included Jefferson City, Mo., St. Louis, Hodgenville, Ky. (Abraham Lincoln was born nearby), Bardstown, Ky., Natural Bridge, Va., Staunton, Va. (the birthplace of Woodrow Wilson), Washington, D.C., Annapolis, Md., Baltimore, New Windsor, Md. (Marshall and Loretta's parents grew up in the area), Harpers Ferry, W.Va., Philadelphia, Atlantic City, N.J., New York City, Boston, Portland, Maine, Montpelier, Vt., Montreal, Ottawa, Buffalo, Erie, Pa., West Springfield, Pa., Cleveland, Toledo, Ohio, Elkhart, Ind., South Bend, Ind., Chicago, Neponset, Ill., Kewanee, Ill., Quincy, Ill., and Cameron, Mo. 

     Some of the attractions Marshall, Ina and Loretta stopped at or viewed were the summer home of Judge John Rowan (Stephen Foster reportedly wrote the song "My Old Kentucky Home" while staying there), Washington and Lee University, Mount Vernon, Arlington National Cemetery, the U.S. Capitol, the Smithsonian Institution, the Corcoran Gallery of Art, the Library of Congress, Grant's Tomb, Radio City, Times Square, Yankee Stadium, Broadway, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Old North Church, Faneuil Hall, King's Chapel, Bunker Hill, Harvard University, the White Mountains, the Old Man of the Mountain, Lake Champlain, Mount Royal, Niagara Falls, the University of Notre Dame, Lincoln Park, Garfield Park, and the Museum of Science and Industry.

     The threesome camped out many nights during the six-week trek and were able to see both Ensor relatives and Dana relatives (Ina Ensor was a Dana) as they covered ground in going from place to place. 

     The cost of transportation for the trip? According to the notes in the Kansas Book Dealers Association writing pad that also made the trip, Marshall spent $52.19 on gasoline and $8.96 on oil for a grand total of $61.15.