It is October 7, 2023 and I am on my way to collect a "box" from Ken, VE3EKN, who ended up as the temporary custodian of paperwork that was removed from the Museum of Science and Technology station, VE3JW, when it closed in 2015. Rather coincidentally, both Ken and I were going through a process of house un-cluttering for our own differing reasons. While I was uncovering various things under embarrasingly thick coats of dust, I came across a pile of QSL cards from VE3JW that were never sent out to the Bureau and a number of pages from the VE3JW log book spanning 1988-89. Not knowing what to do, I discussed this with President Norm, VE3LC, and he declared my penance to transcribe the info in the QSL cards and log sheets to electronic format suitable for uploading to the ARRL Log of The World. Having accepted that task, I set up an Excel spreadsheet which would automatically convert the raw input data to ADIF strings. The task was rather long but is completed, however it led me to wonder where all the VE3JW logs got to or even whether they still exist. A few requests on the 2 metre nets came back with responses that Ken, VE3EKN, had taken all the paperwork and so I connected with him; and none too soon. Ken's house cleaning operation did leave him wondering what to do with the contents of "the box" and, as he told me, he was a hair's breadth away from tossing out the whole lot at the time when I contacted him. Call it serendipity or just plain spooky that I came to the point of contacting him at such a critial time! So, to close on that story, I am now in posession of "the box".
You may ask: "What's in the box?". Well, I'm writing this on impulse after having gone through about a third of it all and wanted to pass along my findings as, perhaps, a first installment on preserving the history of not only VE3JW, but that of the OVMRC. Along with the VE3JW papers, there are also items having to do with the club, some dating back to its establishment in 1958 and various groups of interest formed by members who were involved with, e.g.: a satellite operations group, an historical group, a digital group, and perhaps others that I haven't uncovered yet. Oh, and yes, there are maybe half a dozen log books spanning roughly 1997 to 2013 which will be added to the electronic log for upload to LoTW. Even with the log books, there is one which is a parallel record of VE3JW operation from "Console #2" which seems to have entries over common time periods logged on "Console #1". There is also one log book dedicated to satellite operation, and another dedicated to VE3RAM. Just how I'm going to merge all of those in a suitable form for the LoTW upload remains an open question.
In addition to the log books and OVMRC History Committee files, there are several VHS tapes of events such as Field Day, a few 3.5 inch floppy discs which my computer may be able to read, several commemorative plaques and framed certificates, QSL cards received and ...... other things yet to be discovered. Regarding the VHS tapes, I do have a VHS deck which hasn't been used in many years but may still be serviceable so I might be able to at least review what's on them and figure whether or not to go the next step and convert the tape to mp4 video for archiving on our web site.
So, just when I thought my penance was paid off, it has opened up a much larger task that I'm happy to take on. At this point, I don't think it would lead to a revival of the former OVMRC Historial Committee, but who knows? Anyone out there interested in being the custodian of OVMRC history?
I leave you with some scans of what were probably the last QSL cards printed for VE3JW, one of them being a 40th Anniversary commemorative card bearing short biographies of Jim W. Cotter, VE3JW (SK), and Ed Morgan (SK), one of the founders of the OVMRC.
Hugo, VE3KTN