Ghost Train RadioThe Death of Shortwave Radio
I’ve been in tech for 40 years and have always kept up with the times technology wise. Long before the Internet, there was Shortwave Radio, and between the early 1900’s and perhaps the end of the 1980’s, it had a great place in world history. I got my Ham Radio License in 1973 while in middle school, and it is what directed me into my career in the software field.
Recently I have started getting suggestions for Gene Shepherds old WOR radio broadcasts – and I just listened to these two – which really made me smile – go to YouTube and search for gene shepherd dxing and (my all time favorite) shortwave radio – where he builds a shortwave radio – has a problem with it – and fixes it.
All I can say is thank God I was part of that old scene – right toward the end of its long run. As much as I like the Internet, there was something about shortwave radio that had so much more “juju”. Maybe romance? Anyway – it just seemed like it had a mystery that we don’t have on the Internet – which is way too easy to use and take for granted.
Today’s song is an instrumental (on purpose). Like yesterday – its based on a feeling that is really hard to write words for. In other radio songs I might use some part of the radio experience to lay out some feelings – like radio fading – or whatever, but today – I used a violin (which I just don’t play enough) to try to make some implied radio sounds. I wanted to portray a slight feeling of melancholy – the loss of something that will never come back – but with the excitement and appreciation that my lifetime intersected with this old hobby and technology that gave me so much joy.
Ghost Train Radio 