Most of my radio activity is from our weekend / vacation home in Canaan Valley, West Virginia Grid FM09ga, so you usually hear me as K4THE/8. My 'shack' is at 3700 ft (1130 m) elevation on top of Pointy Knob which is in the Monongehela National Forest area. We are next to a WV state park and near several wildlife preserves. It is a very electro-magnetically quiet area. We average 12 feet of lake effect snow a year. http://www.topozone.com/map.asp?lat=39.0006&lon=-79.4731&datum=nad83

My neighbor's webcam looks NE into the valley http://www.wunderground.com/webcams/TWV60S/1/show.html   It is presently down due to lightning damage. Alternate for now is http://www.fsvisimages.com/doso1/doso1

I currently have there a 20m dipole (storm took down the 80m horizontal loop and the Beverage) and my Kenwood TS-2000 with LDG Z-11Pro tuner. I have a Ten-Tec Argonaut-V and40m horizontal loop in Charlottesville for QRP activity, especially on PSK31. I enjoy rag chewing with interesting people and making new friends in DX countries.  I have recently been playing with WSPR, primarily on 30m and making "contacts" with AUS and NZ using 1 W. see http://wsprnet.org for details on weak signal propagation reporter.

QSL INFO: I am not particularly interested in collecting a lot of cards, however I do like special event stations. I am in the process of converting my manual log to ADIF files and will eventually post them to LOTW and eQSL. I will reply to any card received by the buro or direct, as I know many of you out there like "hardcopy."

My interest in radio began in the early 1940s with late night listening to BC radio on a Crosley car radio in a wooden cabinet and then with homebuilt crystal sets. I moved on to SWL and NDB hunting with a Heathkit AR-2 with Q-multiplier that I built when I was 12 years old, WW-II military surplus radios, several Radio Shack units and finally an Icom R-75. I of coursel istened to the ham bands using the BFO and learned a lot about amateur radio from eavesdropping. I finally got my license (KI4BFM) in 2003 shortly before Iretired and upgraded in the following years.

I was graduated from the University of Rhode Island with BSEE in 1962 and MSEEin '66. I was in the Army reserves then and later went to Vietnam in 1970 as a Captain running a special mission operations team. I spent my civilian career working in the national intelligence community as an all-source analyst. I enjoyed traveling to many countries running various projects and working withour allies.

Other interests included martial arts, flying, SCUBA diving, weightlifting, running, marksmanship and archery. My XYL and I have been married 46 years and have two children in Colorado & two grandchildren.

73 Dennis