I have been a licensed HAM since 1978. I studied for my license while I was in the Navy at Damneck Naval Station, Virginia Beach, Virginia, but passed my first and second FCC exam while I was stationed in Holy Loch, Scotland; when an FCC examiner came to the U.K. to give exams to the military stationed overseas. Moreover, I am the second holder of the W5KOM callsign. The original W5KOM (King Of the Midnighters, or, Kind Old Man) was Cliff Kent. Cliff was well loved by everyone, and best known for starting a little net called the "Knights Of Midnight" (KOM), of which he was the "King Of the Midnighters" (KOM). The net would start on a Fort Worth 2-meter repeater at Mid-night, while Cliff worked as a night security guard at a Car Lot. It wasn't so much of a net as it was a fun, informal, group of people who worked nights, just got off shift, or were night owls. Even when Cliff went into the nursing home he still had his midnight sessions on the air. Cliff became a Silent Key in late 1999. Cliff & his late wife had one adopted daughter, but no natural children or other family. So the HAMs of Dallas/Fort Worth were his family. Near the end of Cliff's life, I use to regularly pick Cliff up from the Nursing Home and take him to breakfast at Denny's, local Ham events, etc. Cliff truly was the "Kind Old Man". So I have chosen to remember Cliff by assuming his call sign. Hopefully I'll age into the "Kind Old Man" (KOM) that he was.

-Thomas Nofsinger PhD., W5KOM - formally KA2ERV & N5FHZ, 10-X#31712.

See: http://engineer.nova.org

http://www.half-timers.net

http://www.half-timers.net/memorial_day.html

http://www.ussholland.org

http://www.holyloch.com

http://holyloch.com/album/assocslideshow.php?directory=2003memorial¤tPic= 2

(w5kom as Chaplin at Navy Reunion, 2003)