More On Improved Technology

While I was reading Mike Cain's Blog this morning, thought back to 1975 when I began getting interested in things like CB Radios and Scanners. Our local Fire Department at that time did not have the Radios like they have today. They used, or at least tried to use CB Radios to communicate. I remember when the Ledoux House burned up on The Buck Hollow Road, the Fire Department was using CB Radios at that time. That is the house where little 7 year old Missy Ledoux died during the fire in 1975. I was driving on the way home from Cambridge around by Giddings Flats when I heard over the CB Radio that the little girl had perished in the fire. Stan Driscoll had a powerful CB Radio with a beam antenna and although he was blind, he used to try to help people, including the fire department whenever there was a need. Stan, his brother Maurice and Mother, Winnie lived in the little white house where the guy has the lawn sales across from Steeple Market. Not sure that we had a Fairfax Rescue in 1975, but I do remember hearing Milton & Essex Rescue on my old Crystal Type Regency Scanner. You had to purchase a specific crystal for each frequency you wanted to listen to. I had an outside antenna also, so I could get better reception.

The scanner I have now, I can program up to 50 frequencies in it and it is about 1/8th the size of the old scanner. I don't need an outside antenna and I can hear for miles around. I actually only listen to our local Fire & Rescue and the Hospital Frequency and Town Trucks.

I am not sure when the Fire Department actually got its UHF Radios, but I do know that the Old CB Radios were kind of useless at times as Skip, which is caused by the Sun Spots, from all over the country would come in and you couldn't even talk to someone two miles away as CBers would try to reach out and talk to you from great distances.

We've come a long way with technology in the past 30 years - Can't begin to imagine what it will be like in another 30 years.