Ten Year Anniversary Graphic

The 10th Anniversary of the Historical Wireless Society of SE Queensland

On 22 June 1997, the HRSA-SEQ group was formed at a meeting in Caloundra.

On 16 June 2007, the members gathered for a buffet dinner at the Mansfield Tavern, Wishart, to celebrate the 10th Anniversary of this founding.

There were 73 attendees, including interstate visitors Mike and Pat Osborne, Rod Smith and Aviva Stillman from Melbourne, John and Jan McIlwaine from Sydney, Richard and Carla Begbie from Canberra and Brian Lackie plus three friends from Central Coast NSW. The evening began with a quality auction conducted by John Murt.

At dinner, HWS president Peter Hadgraft gave a brief speech describing some incidents and personalities in the club's history.

New HRSA President Mike Osborne, as guest speaker, spoke of a 1920's advertisement which featured a letter from the user of a 3 valve super-regen, which had outperformed a big-name 5 valve neutrodyne, demonstrating the art of the sales pitch, and that nothing has changed.

Mike then skilfully set out to mend fences and map the future of HRSA and its relations with other groups of enthusiasts in the radio and associated fields. In one simple act he healed the breach which had developed between the respective clubs, under the previous HRSA administration.

HWS VP Ray Slater as MC moved a vote of thanks and the evening flowed on with door prizes and raffles.

During coffee we were entertained by viewing a DVD, put together by Fil LaSpina and Graham Donaldson. It depicted the Society's involvement in two televised programmes of "Extra" and one of "Totally Wild" put to air in 2000 and 2007. Also on the same DVD was a 1950's movie about "Music Masters" service division. This was very well received by everyone particularly our interstate guests.

Saturday afternoon and the following Sunday morning, the club had a public display of over 300 items at the Ena Carson hall, Mt Gravatt show grounds.

Items included loans from Queensland Museum through Senior Curator Dr Brian Crozier - a Traeger transceiver, and the Traeger pedal wireless foot-powered generator.

Another item was a Soladyne coffin radio which was built in Brisbane by William Dunlop in Corinda and donated by the builder's widow to the museum. The builder's son Ted turned up, thanks to club member Fred Clark, and was photographed with the Soladyne.

Also included was a display of World War II military and Comfort Fund (Amenities) radios. These were provided by Dave Prince with assistance from Les Parker and Col Gladstone of the Brisbane Amateur Radio Club.

We would like to acknowledge our major sponsors who were:

Thank you

Peter Hadgraft (President)