William (Bill) Johnson KB4DE (Amateur Extra, CW Ops #2093)
· Spouse of 52 years: Lora KK4OKT (General)
· We have lived in Central South Carolina since the 1970s.
Career/Education:
· US Navy active duty 1966-1970, US Navy Reserve 1970-1995, retired Master Chief Fire Control Technician (Radar Tech) and former Command Master Chief
· NC State University: BS and Masters in Electrical Engineering in the early 1970s
· 1973-1977 Member of the Technical Staff of Bell Telephone Laboratories
· 1977-2000 Various engineering and manufacturing leadership positions at National Cash Register (NCR Corp.) business computer division
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Amateur Radio:
· Licensed since about 1975. Back then, I mostly operated CW with my father WD4IKK (SK – he operated at 35 wpm, but slowed down for family : – ) Our son is now WD4IKK (General).
· Inactive 1995-2012, and when I returned I got interested in Contesting. I quickly realized that CW would allow me to be much more competitive with 100 W and an attic wire antenna.
· Graduated CWA Levels 1 and 2 in the past year and participated in many CWTs, State QSO Parties, CQ WPX CW, etc.
Lora and I are volunteer instructors for SCHEART, the South Carolina Healthcare Emergency Amateur Radio Team. We teach quarterly license exam preparation courses for Technician, General, and Amateur Extra.
We are active members of the Emergency Communications Team of Lexington County SC Community Emergency Response Team (CERT), sometimes serving as Net Control/Logger for Exercises and Public Events.
We Elmer friends, family, and license class students to get them through the “What Now?” stage after they earn their Technician Class licenses.
Amateur Radio Goals:
· Constantly improving CW capability
· Constantly Improving competitiveness in Contests
· Portable operation for Field Day and park activations
· Satellite operations
This biography is what appeared in Solid Copy when the member joined CWops.