I was originally licensed in 1993 as KD6VEE in Northern California. My family and I moved to NW Montana in 1999. Thanks to the enthusiasm of a recent CA transplant, WR7DW, I upgraded to General class and soon after to EXTRA class (when I requested my current call sign). Our local club formed in 2005 during Field Day. The club increased in size from 4-5 moderately active hams to over 30 in 2006. On 11/30/06 13 people passed their Technician class license, bringing our local ham population to nearly 50. This is in an area whose population is only approx. 3000. We now have 4 local repeaters (2x 2m, 2x 70cm) and plan on adding a 6-meter repeater soon (a 220Mhz and 1.2Ghz are currently being considered as well). Please visit our website at www.tvarc.org.

I am a 1988 EE graduate of Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo. I have worked at the same company since graduation, Maxim Integrated Products (www.maxim-ic.com). My wife is a ham too - KE7DNK. My kids have shown great enthusiam for the ham radio hobby and I expect they will be licensed sometime in 2007 [UPDATE: the little one I am holding in the picture above is now licensed as K7MKC (previously KF7BWU) - my oldest has resumed his study of the Tech question pool].

My interests include: watching my kids play ice-hockey, collecting early hand-cranked Edison, Columbia and Victor phonographs and records, listening to music, playing DOD, scanning the HF/VHF/UHF bands, playing on the lake, hiking, ATVing, road/mountain biking in the summer and snow skiing in the winter. Life is good in NW Montana! (And NO, we are not cowboys!)