page_title: History of amateur radio
section_title: Between the wars
hierarchical_section_title: History of amateur radio / Between the wars
caption_attribution_description: English: 1 kW station built by Mr. Ralph Batcher, of Toledo, Iowa, with the assistance of the 1916 edition of this book
context_page_description: The history of amateur radio, dates from the dawn of radio communications, with published instructions for building simple wireless sets appearing at the beginning of the twentieth century. Throughout its history, amateur radio enthusiasts have made significant contributions to science, engineering, industry, and social services. Research by amateur radio operators has founded new industries, built economies, empowered nations, and saved lives in times of emergency.
  Amateur radio is a hobby and, by law, completely non-commercial. Individual amateur "ham" radio operators pursue the avocation for personal pleasure through building their own radio stations and communicating with their fellows globally, and for self-improvement via study and practice of electronics, computers, and radio and TV wave behavior. Radio amateurs are, thus, "amateurs" in the true sense of the word: pursuit of an activity only for the love of it. Radio amateurs can not broadcast or transmit music and other general public entertainment programming. The amateur radio use of the air waves is for personal satisfaction and for forwarding the "state of the art" of electronics and communication techniques.
context_section_description: In 1921, a challenge was issued by American hams to their counterparts in the United Kingdom to receive radio contacts from across the Atlantic. Soon, many American stations were beginning to be heard in the UK, shortly followed by a UK amateur being heard in the US in December 1922. November 27, 1923 marked the first transatlantic two-way contact between American amateur Fred Schnell and French amateur Léon Deloy. Shortly after, the first two way contact between the UK and USA was in December 1923, between London and West Hartford, Connecticut. In the following months 17 American and 13 European amateur stations were communicating. Within the next year, communications between North and South America; South America and New Zealand; North America and New Zealand; and London and New Zealand were being made.
  These international Amateur contacts helped prompt the first International Radiotelegraph Conference, held in Washington, DC, USA in 1927–28. At the conference, standard international amateur radio bands of 80/75, 40, 20 and 10 meters and radio callsign prefixes were established by treaty.
  In 1933 Robert Moore, W6DEI, begins single-sideband voice experiments on 75 meter lower sideband. By 1934, there were several ham stations on the air using single-sideband.
caption: Early homebrew amateur radio transmitter
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