Short Wave Magazine - The Listener's Guide Book

In thousands of shacks across Britain and Europe hides an unregarded little yellow book. Its thickness lends itself to being wedged beneath the leg of the workbench to take out the wobble that spills tea on the logbook. Many have already found the paper is not absorbent, so it has no function as a mop. Some folk even read it.

This was the kind of astute reader who would advise you should never turn a hobby into a job. When I applied to Lowe Electronics in the quondam days of 1980, I was hoping to get into their new PC business. I stumbled through the interview looking at all the gleaming radio gear wondering if they would rumble my lack of interest in input-output buffering. They did.

Taken aside by the legend that is JW, he asked, "How would you align an RA17?" I told him you don't, unless you have the kit and the knowledge. Before long the SWL poacher turned game-keeper becoming an ARSE (Amateur Radio Service Engineer, sorry) up at The Emporium. A dream job for an anorak.

Bill Lowe had a certain turn of phrase. His copy caught the mood of our hobby at that time, pre-Advertising Standards Authority. I tried to catch his spirit in various listening notes packed with every wireless. It wasn't long before it was decided they should come together in The Listeners Guide.

It was written long-hand, a page a day, proof-read over a cheeky white wine in the Main Office to howls of laughter. Were they laughing at me or with me?

The first edition with a yellow cover, now very collectible, was then updated with a technical supplement by John Thorpe under grey covers, made a print-run of over 15,000 copies. It got a tremendous response and is still used today. If you still have and, heaven forefend, still read that original version, do let me know.

Times changed, Lowe's changed and I was out in the cold in spite of the anorak. Like too many folk on their own, I surfed the web. I was at one with the feeling of poverty, so many of the young ladies there could not afford clothes. Lycos liked the idea of vanity publishing, so I took a web page for The Guide. Nothing happened.

Our hobby is based on the Laws of Physics which go back a bit so don't be too upset by Old School thinking. It's all in there, somewhere. Old meets new with live news and propagation reports.

As Alex Lester at BBC Radio 2 says, "You have awakened my inner nerd".

We all have one, so we might as well look after it.