73 MAGAZINE SAYS "73 AND QRT"
After completing 43 years of publication, 73 Amateur Radio Today magazine
is calling it quits. Plans to publish a joint October/November issue fell
through this week, and the September 2003 issue was the magazine's last.
According to self-proclaimed "El Supremo and Founder" Wayne
S. Green II, W2NSD, it was a simple matter of economics.
"After failing a last minute effort to collect on some larger accounts
receivable we decided yesterday to throw in the towel--that the September
issue will have to be the last," Green told ARRL October 9. "SK
after 43 years of publishing."
The first issue of 73 was published in October 1960 from what Green -
a former editor of CQ - once described as "a small, dingy apartment"
in Brooklyn, New York. Since the summer of 1962, 73 has been based in
Peterborough, New Hampshire - Green's home state. The magazine was a pioneer
promoter of SSB, FM, solid-state, easy construction projects and the marriage
of personal computing and Amateur Radio. His interest in microcomputing
led Green in 1975 to found Byte, a magazine devoted to the then-nascent
and largely do-it-yourself computer hobby.
At the peak of its popularity in the 1970s and 1980s, individual issues
of 73 totalled more than 300 pages of ads, articles and commentary. Heading
each issue was Green's inimitable "Never Say Die" - some would
say never-ending - editorial, in which he rarely missed an opportunity
to tweak the ARRL and his magazine competitors for their perceived shortcomings.
QST Editor Steve Ford, WB8IMY, says 73 published his first article in
the 1970s. "I was saddened to hear that 73 has ceased publishing,"
Ford said. "Wayne's excitement about the growing amateur FM repeater
phenomenon at the time was infectious."
Green's 73 editorials and regular round of personal appearances originally
concentrated on Amateur Radio and his ideas to improve, advance and grow
it. In recent years, however, they've veered into conspiracy theories,
cures for cancer, AIDS and other ailments and Green's proliferation of
book titles on those topics.
Green says he'll continue his essays on his Web site (http://www.waynegreen.com)
for those subscribers who mainly bought the magazine for them." He
told ARRL that no definite arrangements have been made yet about how to
handle outstanding 73 subscriptions.
CQ Publisher Dick Ross, K2MGA, said he takes no joy from the passing
of 73. "The loss of any publication serving Amateur Radio leaves
all of us a bit poorer," he said. "Thank you, Wayne, for 43
entertaining, informative, sometimes infuriating, and always interesting
years of 73. We'll genuinely miss it."
|
