Is the Radiotelegraph Code Obsolete?

 

Outsiders and some of those looking into Amateur Radio often ask this question: "Isn't the Morse code obsolete? Hasn't modern technology displaced it?"

 

Back in 1912 nobody balked at learning the code: it was simple then -- if you didn't know the code you couldn't even listen and understand, much less communicate, by wireless.

 

But today it refuses to lie down and die. Why? Not only old timers, but many newcomers have found that it is a skill worth learning, a pleasure just as any other skill. There is a real sense of pleasure and achievement in communicating this way. Some find it an excellent means of escape, a way to forget immediate work-a-day problems and completely absorb one's attention.

 

There is practical value also. It can get a message though where other methods fail. Operators have long known that Morse code signals penetrate distance, and go through interference and static where voice signals can't hack it. This is why low power (QRP) enthusiasts find that it is far superior to voice. Besides this, the equipment required, both transmitting and receiving, is much simpler and smaller, uses less power, and in an emergency can often be built up from simple, available parts.

 

These factors did not escape the Russian communists. They were also deeply impressed with the reliability, simplicity and lower cost of equipment for code communication and ease in maintaining it. (In the same line of thinking, their military radio gear has all been vacuum tube type to avoid potential damage due to radiation.) Therefore, through the years they have popularized and promoted learning the Morse code and developing skill in its use. It was included among their civilian "sports" activities. Contests and prizes were offered to the best and fastest operators. This would assure them of a pool of skilled, high-speed operators in event of war. Several years ago a couple of American soldiers who were amateurs were taken captive from a ship which was too close to North Korean shores. They were surprised to find that very many civilians in that country readily understood code.

 

In recent years our own military seem to have awakened to all this, and have re-begun to train some personnel for Morse code operation. In addition, they have realized that Morse is an effective means of communicating during periods when the enemy is jamming. There are other advantages also. It uses the next to narrowest signal bandwidth (PSK31 uses less but requires a computer) , which for amateur use means more channels are available within a band. It has much superior signal-to-noise ratio, and in addition, an operator can soon learn to separate (mentally "filter") signals, which are very close together by differences in pitch, speed and style of sending.

Learning the Morse code
An Overview - Where we are going?

 

If you are looking for any magic, any secrets, any tricks here -- or hypnotism -- you won't find it. What we do offer is just practical, time-tested working methods, which together take advantage of all that has been learned over the years about how to teach and learn the Morse code efficiently and well.

 

George Hart, long time code expert with ARRL, put it this way: "The greatest obstacle in learning code is the method used."

 

Ted R. McElroy, teacher and long time code speed champion, said that any normal person can easily achieve 25-wpm. This is an easily achievable and reasonable goal. One who can handle this speed comfortably is a good operator.

 

The original American Morse code of 1845 was designed to communicate: to transmit over the telegraph wires any and every kind of written message or information in letter-perfect, number-perfect, and punctuation-perfect form. It was recorded as a wiggly line on a strip of paper tape to be read or interpreted by eye. Very soon the operators discovered that they could read the recorder's noises accurately by ear, and so in time sounders slowly began to replace the recorders.

 

Not very long after this, beginning operators became so skilled that they began to chit-chat easily over the wires among themselves, much like radio amateurs do today when they "chew the rag". That kind of freedom should be our goal - easy, natural use of the code to communicate, similar to the way we read and talk. That's where we are headed.

 

The code is not a new language. It is the language you already know, "written" in sound patterns instead of patterns of ink on paper - it is your own language. You will learn to "read" by ear the language you already read so well by eye.

 

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