By Dave Jensen, W7DGJ

It's been the mission of this column for nearly three years now to celebrate innovation and innovators. To that end, #62 identifies a few of the special people whom I have researched over the years who should be celebrated.  In many cases, I have written entire columns about their exploits, but in this case it's limited to those who share certain "mindsets." The text in bold is the mindset, or trait, that I feel the innovator possessed. (I have derived some of those from one of my favorite books, 'The Book of Mental Toughness Mantras" by Chris Dorris.) Please share your thoughts in the attached forum discussion linked at the bottom.

Innovation Mantra: The "How" is in the "What"

Sometimes you have a great idea  . . . you see this thing out there on the horizon, but then realize that the "getting there" part looks like a major obstacle. I've had this issue many times in my life. I see this wonderful prize off in the future, something dear to my heart or an idea the world needs, but it's that "how" that holds me back. Successful innovators know to just charge ahead, and worry about the "how" later.

Years ago, when the Internet was just developing (remember America Online?) Fred Lloyd --founder of QRZ.com -- was working as an engineer for Sun Microsystems. He was an avid radio amateur as well. I hate to stick Fred with the "old guy" label, but this was all before Google and Amazon.com. The Internet was in its infancy. Fred knew that Amateur Radio "Call Books" had been a thing since about 1920, but they were all published as hard copies. His concept to produce digital versions on CD-Rom was a success, and as that early business grew, he felt that the so-called information superhighway might be an even better use of his Call Book detail. That's where the dream of what Fred saw in the future looked so difficult, as there really wasn't a wide use of the net. There were no Internet for Dummies books or pre-developed templates to put up a website and get that idea of his into reality. He had to do it all himself, and in 1993 he turned the switch on for QRZ.com.

Do you have to be a Marconi or an Armstrong to build something new and powerful, something that can be used by countless others and better their world? Fred showed us that all you need to do is to find a good idea and make it better. He turned written call books into digital information that anyone could tap to make their radio life more productive and fun. He completely disregarded his fear of "how" in favor of visualizing his future success as a part of the growing Internet.

Innovation Mantra: Relinquish the Need to Defend

One of the most-popular antenna designs for HF has, since the 1960's, been the G5RV wire antenna. Whether you built one of these or acquired one of the numerous copies or spin-offs on the market, it's a great performer across many bands, and as a result is often strung up in the yard by new amateurs. Or where XYL's and HOA's prohibit huge towers and beams. 

G5RV was a famous Ham, Mr. Louis Varney of Sussex County in England. As Louis was experimenting from 1946-on with his antenna design in preparation for publication, he encountered the usual negative comments and obstacles thrown up by other amateurs. "It will never fly, as the SWR is just too high on the usable bands," or "You really can't have an aerial that covers all amateur frequencies. It's just impossible." And instead of allowing the push-back to affect his thoughts about the antenna, he spent 12 years quietly refining it and ensuring that the design was as solid as he knew it could be. His publication in 1958, "An Effective Multi-band Aerial of Simple Construction" proved to be extremely popular in a bulletin of the Radio Society of Great Britain (RSGB).

Varney never felt the need to defend his design. He put it into the public domain from day one, encouraging others to put their concerns into improving it. Multiple versions of the antenna have been released over the years, some with improvements on certain bands, but the basic G5RV design still stands the test of time and is likely the most popular antenna every built or sold. Even companies like MFJ and others copied and sold thousands of these over the years. If Varney had been swayed by the naysayers or spent countless hours defending his work, it's doubtful that it would have made history in the way that it has. "Relinquish the need to defend" should be a mantra shared by all who innovate. (PS - The "need to defend" seems to have a much stronger pull in the world of social media than ever before.)

Innovation Mantra: You Can't Create from a Low-Grade State

One of the most well-known radio innovators in the early years was Hugo Gernsback. He is known as the father of the modern-day science fiction story, and recognized for his contributions by the annual Hugo Award. Hugo was also an enthusiastic believer in the power of "radio for the masses."

His business brought forward one of the first consumer products in this category, and he was constantly thinking up new ways to communicate across long distances. When he set his mind to the further development of a community of radio enthusiasts, he founded the Wireless Association of America (WAA) which pre-dated the ARRL and which had over 15,000 members. The WAA was rarely, if ever, mentioned by Maxim or QST in later years as the ARRL grew; hence, I believe that Hugo got somewhat less acclaim than he deserved.

The mindset mentioned above, referring to one's state-of-mind, was one that Hugo Gernsback was very familiar with and for which he spent endless hours trying to improve. The device you see in the photo never became a consumer product, but it was successfully used by Gernsback to improve his mental state as he created . . . that is, whether he was writing science fiction or designing a new radio. I would love to have a device that completely blocks out all interruptions. For me, the best I can do is insert my Apple AirPods and crank up some Mozart, which puts me into a high-grade mental state (until my wife or son walk into the room and I see mouths moving . . . then, I have to shut down and start all over again.)

Innovation Mantra: Be Curious

Friedrich Clemens Gerke was an extremely creative and prolific fellow, a German writer, musician, journalist and telegraphy pioneer who developed the International Morse Code (the version we use today) in 1848. He grew up in very modest circumstances, and in his early years worked as an assistant to another German scientist, Arnold Schuback, where he likely picked up his first experience with the power of curiosity. Over the young man's early life he was consistently engaged in music and writing, where he expressed a great deal of creativity -- whether it was entertaining sailors with his clarinet in pubs on the Hamburg waterfront or writing stories critical of the government for the local papers. 

It was when he got his first real job working with the telegraph industry that he noted the rather severe shortcomings of American Morse Code. He was employed by the new line that had been put up in Hamburg by the Elektro-Magnetische Telegraph Companie, and he spent his evenings and free time working out a code change that would modify about half the characters. His musical expertise gave him some sense of rythmn, and he defined the length of a dash at three times the length of a dot, while clarifying the space between characters and words. Before Gerke, Vail's version of the code (Morse's partner in the effort who was more engaged in code than Samuel Morse) used a number of different space lengths and key hold-down times. Gerke's innate sense of curiosity was all that drove him . . . could this confusing aspect of the American code be modified so as to make transmissions smoother and more reliably copied? 

Gerke's curiosity became an obsession, and he was convincing enough to move the entire German system to the new code in 1851, but it took 14 years to persuade the ITU to move to the new International Morse Code standard in 1865. Did he worry about the improvements he made and whether or not they'd stay only in Germany? Gerke believed in another of these innovator's mantra's, "Worry is a misuse of imagination." He knew that common sense would prevail and it did.

Innovation Mantra: Embrace Uncertainty, Paradox, and Ambiguity

Al Gross (W8PAL) is often known as the "father of the Walkie Talkie." Even though there was a lot of ambiguity about who invented the technology (Donald Hings or Henryk Magnuski of Motorola were two often-cited "inventors of the Walkie Talkie."), Gross plowed ahead in 1938 until he had working radios that could be utilized in war time and beyond. Now, he is almost universally considered the true inventor of this radio format.

A decade later, Al Gross was the first businessman to jump into the newly-announced Citizen Band frequencies. Everyone else was wondering "What do we do with these new frequencies?" while Al was making money selling more than 100,000 radios to USA farmers -- as well as the Coast Guard. Never mind the fact that it was a new market with a completely untested market size. Uncertainty like this was nothing to Al Gross. Later, the New York Times called Al the "grandfather of CB radio." 

He was ahead of the times in some cases. For example, he invented the cordless telephone, as well as the telephone pager. At the time of the invention of this small pocket sized receiver for urgent messages sent by telephone, it was intended for doctors. But doctors didn't want to be disturbed while on the Golf Course, or while they were in with a patient. As a result, Gross never made a lot of money from his numerous patents. When called a "famous inventor" by a journalist, he declared that he was not an inventor, but that he'd been lucky enough to have developed some interesting technologies that were unique enough to be considered innovations. "It's the entrepreneur who makes the real money," he told that journalist. It's Henry Ford or Bill Gates who figures out how to take innovations into the market and sell them. 

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I hope we'll have an opportunity again soon to highlight additional innovation mantras and identify radio examples for QRZ readers. Thank you and please visit our forum linked below to add your comments!   VY 73,   Dave W7DGJ

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