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Ham Radio Paranormal?

David E. Greer (N4KZ) on December 20, 2012 

By Dave, N4KZ

I've been kicking around the ham bands since the late 1960s when I was in high school and like many active hams, I've had some really interesting, even odd on-air experiences. But one incident in particular from a couple of years ago made the little hairs on the back of my neck stand up and I've thought about it often since.


If you watch any of the numerous TV shows on cable these days about the paranormal, you know about EVPs -- Electronic Voice Phenomena. Supposedly, they are the recorded voices of ghosts attempting to communicate with the living. What I experienced on 75-meter SSB one night was downright spooky. And sounded much like an EVP.

First, a little background. I was a high-school freshman when I got my ticket in the late 1960s. After college, broadcast work took me to Michigan and the FCC assigned me the callsign WB8TOB.

On many occasions in the mid-1970s, I worked George Goldstone, W8AP (SK), locally on 10-meter ground wave. One Sunday afternoon, I called CQ and W8AP answered. I just blurted out off the top of my head:

"W8 Associated Press," this is "Whiskey Bravo 8 Tired Old Broadcaster."

Henceforth, my new phonetics stuck. I was known as WB8 Tired Old Broadcaster. And since I worked as a newsman at a Detroit radio station, it fit. Except the old part -- I was in my 20s at the time.

In December 1979, I went to the Detroit FCC office and upgraded my advanced ticket to extra. In January 1980, I received my new call -- KJ8S. Two years later, a new job took me back home to Kentucky and yet another call, WE4K. And then in 1996, I used the new vanity call program to secure my present-day call of N4KZ.

About two years ago, I was talking on the air with Mark, N4ME, in Tallahassee. We got our tickets together in the '60s and still have a weekly schedule on 75-meter SSB.

One night Mark and I were in mid-QSO and as I paused briefly between transmissions, I heard something that stopped me cold. Very faintly on frequency, just barely above the noise level I heard a male voice slowly whisper the words "Tired Old Broadcaster."

Keep in mind I hadn't held the WB8TOB callsign for 30 years. Immediately, I froze. Just who tuning randomly across the band would have recognized that N4KZ had been WB8TOB 30 years earlier and known about the Tired Old Broadcaster phonetics?

I asked the person who'd just whispered Tired Old Broadcaster on frequency to identify. No reply.

I called out the names and calls of several friends from my Michigan days but no one answered. A few days later, I emailed three of them. To a man, all denied knowing what I was talking about.

So, what or who did I hear? Beats me. Maybe it was nothing more than an innocent prank by someone. Or maybe it was more. To this day, I still have no answers.

Font: eHam.net - Ham Radio on the net 

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