Phone Call from FAIRS founding member Bob Freibertshauser W6YMR

Phone call from a founding member of FAIRS Bob Freibertshauser W6YMR 11-30-06

It was a real pleasure to get a phone call yesterday from Bob Freibertshauser W6YMR.  It was during May of 1991 that Bob and his wife Virginia made the trip with us to the former Soviet Union; also on that trip was John DouglasN0ISL.  Thiswas the second visit for my wife Gaynell and me. The first few visits to our Soviet ham friends were really exciting and this was the last one for us before the fall old the old Soviet Union.

Bob, Virginia, John, Gaynell and I were traveling from Moscow to Lvov, Ukraine by train with several of our Soviet ham friends when we developed the idea for the “Foundation for Amateur International Radio Service” (FAIRS). It was also interesting about the date of the journey  May 9, 1991 and that is how we came up with the FAIRS 59 Group for the name of the founding members of FAIRS.  I will do a full story on the founding in a future article.  Radio amateurs will appreciate the 59 as a good report.

Back to the phone call from Bob.  He told me they are now living in a place where ham radio is not allowed and wanted to know how to use Echolink with his computer so he could stay in contact with some of his ham friends of many years.   Bob and his wife are in the early 80's now and are doing well, but have slowed down in their lifestyle a lot.  Bobwas a very active ham for many years and a very good technical person with radios, antennas and the various modes of communication- and misses that a lot now.

We talked a lot about old times and he asks me about the folks that made those trips with us (Bob and Virginiamade a second Soviet trip in 1992). I was sorry to tell him that John Douglas N0ISL has passed away several years ago. John was not only a founding member of FAIRS but a great guy and a real serious ham.  He was also a real supporter of FAIRS and the work of the foundation.  When John returned home from his first trip he went to work and gather up about 75 Personal computers to ship to the Soviet hams. Getting the computers into the USSR was a whole exciting story and maybe I can write about that sometime.  We all miss John very much.

Bob not only made the Soviet trips with FAIRS, but also did some serious radio work in Haiti and Zimbabwe.  Sometimes traveling with Virginia and sometimes alone.  He told one story about leaving Zimbabwe on the only plane in their air fleet and the engine fell off as they were tryingto take off (later I learned it was bad but the engine did not really fall off). Please note that Bob and his wife were both in their 70s for the first FAIRS trip to the Soviet Union in 1991…

You are not too old to put all your good ham radio experience to good use and generate some good will and have a great experience.  We have an article in the January 2007 issue of QST “Calling All Amateurs…”.  It is about getting out and making an impact with a ham radio adventure and sharing your expertise.

We talked a long time about some of the old ham radio days for Bob and myself. It was really nice to hear from an old ham friend and know he and Virginia are still doing OK.

Any who would like to contact Bob let me know.

Have a great day Dave Larsen , Director FAIRS - KK4WW

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