Cass County Amateur Radio Club has been in continuous operation since
April 14, 1953. The club currently operates THREE repeaters on 147.180 MHZ. 145.23 MHZ and 443.650 MHZ, under the call sign W9VMW, first licensed in May 1955. The club is a member of the ARRL (Amateur Radio Relay League), the Indiana Repeater Council, and the Indiana Radio Club Council (March 1954).

The people present at the first organizational meeting were:

The original Charter Members were:

• K9AWH - Bob Minnick

• K9HFC - Harry Burkhart

• W9CFI - Randy Lanning

• W9HST - Chuck Mays

• W9ILU - Nelson Shepherd

• W9MBG - Eugene Buntain

• W9RDF  - Walt Downham now W9ALT

• W9EGV  - John Frye

• W9WT  - Herman Schmidt

• W9ZYR  - Bob Gharis

• No Call  - Paul Mays

All Charter Members were voted Life Members.

     In 1974 the club had 3 members, then someone said, “Let’s put up a repeater.” K9DVL - Dave spent the Club’s entire treasury at $100.00 to buy a used GE tube type repeater that came out of service on the toll road. K9DVL - Dave and WA9DTT - Woody built a homemade duplexer from a QST article. The original repeater pairing was 146.34/94 back in the days of crystals for frequency control. We moved the 147.180 repeater from the sexton’s house to the new water tank that was built at Chase Park, which is its present location. The repeater started in 1974 or 1975. Within a year the Club had 25 members.
     The original repeater pairing was 146.34/94 back in the days of crystals for frequency control. The Auxiliary Station call at the time when we had the WR9 repeater call.
     Testing started 1991 with WA8HSU - Bill Wells being in charge. Then K9PSR - Ed Norris took it over. Presently K9EQT - Don Hyman. Testing Sanctioning body was and still is W5YI.
     The Club has a Thursday Night Net at 8:30 pm. This has been since the early days of the club. AC9X - Guy Mathis started the Saturday Night Net at 8:00 pm. in 2001, then passed it on to KC9AWS - Robert Fickle that ended in summer of 2003.
     The Club held a Special Events Station for their 50^th Anniversary. This was held after the club meeting on October 18^th, 2003, at the Cass County Emergency Management Agency building from 12 noon to 6 pm.

      Operating on these frequencies:

• 7.250 MHZ.  (40 Meters)

• 14.280 MHZ (20 Meters)

• 146.52 MHZ. (2 Meters)

            Past to present meeting locations:

• Logansport City Building, City Court Room, 1953

• National Guard Armory

• City Lock-up

• Legion Club, 1956 (Next to the Memorial Home)

• Smit Brewery, on 5^th street

• Loner Lumber Co.

• Cemetery Sextant’s Office

• Water Street Sub Station, 1973-1974

• YMCA

• Logansport State Hospital

• Cass County Highway Garage

• Harvey’s Restaurant, 1989

• Public Library

• Memorial Home Annex, upstairs

• Private Homes

• Cass County EMA (Emergency Management Agency), 1991 to present

            Service Projects:                             

• Bicentennial Celebration, 1976

• Iron Horse Parade Coordination

• Tracking contestants in the Iron Horse Triathlons

• Iron Horse Train Excursions

• Assisting the start of the American Legion Easter Egg Hunts at Riverside Park

• License testing

            Disaster Situations:

• Tornadoes at Monticello, 1974

• Blizzards, several - there was one year the simulated emergency statewide test was cancelled because of the real thing.

• Weather spotting situations

• Local Flooding

• Drowning on the Eel River

• Lost child searches

            Present or Former Club Members Famous:

• W5OJ - Kent Castle - Member of Johnson Space Center Amateur Radio Club

• W9ILU - Nelson Shepherd - Mid Cars Net Control Operator

• W9LVY -Phil Snider - Frequency Coordinator for the Indiana Repeater Council in 1974.

• K9EQT - Don Hyman - Is known for his work on microwave and satellite work for Cox Communications. Went all over the country to fix problems. He took his test for Novice and Tech licenses at the Memorial Home Annex upstairs.

• WA8HSU - Bill Wells - FCC rules proposals, including reducing the number of ham license class from 6 to 3, and having only one Morse code test at 5 wpm. He worked at General Motors and designed the original variable speed intermittent windshield wiper control that used only one transistor to do multiple functions.

• W9VP - Bill Pickart - is known for being a contester.

• W9EGV - John Frye - Lived on Spear Street, wrote the Carl & Jerry stories form 1960 to 1965, the stories were in the Popular Electronics. He also wrote many equipment reviews. He was in a wheelchair due to polio affecting his legs.

• AA9FM - Greg Bell - Has a Gold Medal from the Olympics.

• K9WET - Ralph Piercy - Emergency Coordinator for Cass County. Appointed Section Emergency Coordinator for the State of Indiana during the Palm Sunday tornado that went thru. The tornado went thru just south of Logansport. With being the SEC he got to go thru Russiaville, which was almost annihilated and followed the path thru to Kokomo and Greentown, there was nothing left on the south side of Greentown.

The history of the club is a never ending work in progress containing information from many sources including newsletters, old meeting minutes, email and memory. Any documentation, historical artifacts, special event flyers, pictures and memorable stories would be appreciated for inclusion. If you wish to donate an artifact, document or a story, please contact

Anna Hendrickson
KC9IDO@arrl.net