QSL CB Radio Cards
Howdy and greetings from Bighappyfunhouse! This week I bought a big box of photographs at the I-80 flea market. At the bottom of the box was a big stack of these old QSL Cards. They're postcards that were traded by CBers and Ham Radio operators.
To me, they look like folk art.
I'd love to see an internet version of these. QSL cards for blogs.
I don't know about yall but looking at these make me want to go out and buy an El Camino, a good Cobra CB (with a 200 watt kicker), a big ass six foot whip antenna and hit the open road.
These last two are from the backs of a couple of the cards.
Labels: cb, folk art, hillbillies, pabst blue ribbon, sparton bluebird radio
posted by Ron @ 11:40 AM
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WOW! What a great post! Thank You!
This brings back some solid memories of my dad who was (is) a huge CB fanatic. He has a huge collection of these types of QSL cards from all over the world. Many of them have the same type of "folk art" style that you mention. This gives me a great idea for a blog idea as well as a way to commemorate a time when CB'ing was one of those crazy fads of the 70's. I fondly remember my dad up at all hours of the nights sending out 73's and 88's to people across the globe.
thanks again.
These aren't ham radio QSL cards...they're from Citizen Band operators, some of whom were ham radio wannabees. Depending on the phase of the sunspot cycle, it's difficult to impossible to get a 27 MHz Citizens Band signal to go far enough to merit a QSL card.
At legal power levels, anyway.
73 de Maggie, amateur radio station K3XS (ex-KPT4447 on Citizen's Band)
I love these cards too, but they aren't
ham radio cards! These are all
Citizens Band cards (remember CB?)
You can tell by the format of the
call signs... -Larry, K4EO
Thanks for the flashback! My dad was a CBer and I remember him sending out and collecting these cards.
Hi - came her from BoingBoing and bookmarked you. If you haven't, you should go here: http://hamgallery.com/qsl
Amazing!
What is a 73 and and 88? Is it the same as a 3 or 8 that some of the cards have?
These are fantastic. Thanks for sharing!
add KNCC-1701 to the list. Starship call "enterprise" Back in the day we had to pay the F.C.C. an extra $25 to get that call sign
Hehe! The days of shooting "skip" with illegal CB power - nuthin' like it! All these handles were prolly outlaws in the eyes of the Fancy Candy Company, who diligently patrolled the ether, lookin to bust the perps - what a joke.
Awsome!! Any chance you could translate the 73's and the 88's, and what does QSL mean?
Love the art and the imagination.
Thanks -- Dana
I found a bunch myself--some have really overt sexual themes and mention "swapping" a lot...
My grandpa was a "ham" (W0YKV) from the late 1930s (when he was a teenager) until he died in 1984. I found some of his QSL cards in a drawer, some dated in the 30s, others in the 70s. Many of the hams got pretty elaborate with their design, as opposed to the folkier designs shown here.
A friend of mine and I were talking about a modern equivalent at a Seattle Wireless meeting. Seattle Wireless is all about building community networks with off-the-shelf gear. We'd been talking about open wireless access points and (mostly) jokingly came up with the idea of QSL cards "Confirming 2-way contact with your access point 'linksys' at 2209Z" etc.
Hmm, never knew CBers used QSL cards.
73 = Best regards
88 = Love & kisses
QSL = Acknowledgement of receipt (of a radio transmission).
73's = best wishes's (sic)
Breaker 1-9............ this here's KBCZ-9877, "Space Angel," sending out bunches of 73s and 88s to all my good buddies out there.
Gotta motor, keep the bugs off your bumper and the bears off your donkey, catch you on the flipside........ mercy sakes, the 10-36 be 10:36!
10-7 for now..........
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