{"id":5540,"date":"2018-10-14T15:15:47","date_gmt":"2018-10-14T20:15:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/?p=5540"},"modified":"2018-10-14T15:18:11","modified_gmt":"2018-10-14T20:18:11","slug":"classic-book-radio","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/?p=5540","title":{"rendered":"Classic Book Radio~5 Years Old!"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>September 23, 2013 MFH (My Favorite Husband) and I wrote up our application to the FCC (Federal Communications Commission) to be granted a low power FM radio station and that day we Incorporated our radio station: Classic Book Radio.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/?attachment_id=5542\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-5542\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-5542\" src=\"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/44117046_1892292960890831_7701404075769724928_n.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"539\" height=\"222\" srcset=\"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/44117046_1892292960890831_7701404075769724928_n.jpg 539w, http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/44117046_1892292960890831_7701404075769724928_n-300x124.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 539px) 100vw, 539px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>We waited on pins and needles&#8230;waiting and waiting for the word from &#8220;on high&#8221; to see if we would be the proud recipients of a FM radio station!<\/p>\n<p>See, both MFH and I are Amateur Radio Operators (hams).\u00a0 MFH has always been an active ham radio person.\u00a0 I have not. I&#8217;m a &#8220;bad ham.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>I can remember back in high school when MFH wrote me a letter during our summer break telling me he&#8217;d just earned his technical license. This was a big deal thing!<\/p>\n<p>Back in those days (1970&#8217;s) a &#8220;ham&#8221; had to know &#8220;code&#8221; (Morse Code) to earn their license.\u00a0 He had done that plus learned all the technical stuff you needed to earn that license.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/?attachment_id=5541\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-5541\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-5541\" src=\"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/43951020_1892302884223172_5939452639472254976_n.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"745\" height=\"960\" srcset=\"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/43951020_1892302884223172_5939452639472254976_n.jpg 745w, http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/43951020_1892302884223172_5939452639472254976_n-233x300.jpg 233w, http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/43951020_1892302884223172_5939452639472254976_n-624x804.jpg 624w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 745px) 100vw, 745px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>These days you don&#8217;t have to know code to earn your technical license&#8230;.which is a good thing or else I&#8217;d probably have never earned mine!\u00a0 I&#8217;ve listened to code a lot.\u00a0 It&#8217;s really fun to listen to.\u00a0 It&#8217;s like little hyperactive squirrels chattering away.\u00a0 I can&#8217;t make heads or tails of it but MFH is pretty good at it!<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"625\" height=\"469\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/_J8YcQETyTw?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"autoplay; encrypted-media\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Anyway, because he&#8217;s always been an active ham, he had learned about the openings the FCC would have available.\u00a0 They hadn&#8217;t had this opening for about 10 years so this was news!<\/p>\n<p>MFH thought long and hard because we would need something special to be granted a license for a station.\u00a0 We bounced ideas off each other and then MFH came up with a great idea!!!<\/p>\n<p>We both enjoy listening to audio books when we travel.\u00a0 By hook or by crook, we had stumbled across a site called Librovox.org\u00a0 They had worked with the Gutenburg Project to take all the printed materials in the public domain and, with the help of volunteer readers, record those materials!<\/p>\n<p>https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Project_Gutenberg<\/p>\n<p>All of the audio recordings are available for download to whoever would like to listen.\u00a0 We had taken to downloading a few books before a trip and listening to them while traveling.<\/p>\n<p>https:\/\/librivox.org\/<\/p>\n<p>We contacted these organizations and received permission to transmit their recordings as our radio station content!\u00a0 Sweet!!!\u00a0 We would be an audio book radio station!\u00a0 No music.\u00a0 No commercials&#8230;just books!<\/p>\n<p>After what seemed like a lifetime of waiting, we got the news from the FCC that we had been granted our radio station!!!<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/?attachment_id=5543\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-5543\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-5543\" src=\"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/tenor.gif\" alt=\"\" width=\"498\" height=\"223\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Now, we had to get to work.\u00a0 We had an 18 month &#8220;construction permit&#8221; and in those 18 months we had to purchase all the equipment needed to run and operate a radio station.\u00a0 18 months sounds like a long time but in reality, it&#8217;s not.\u00a0 The FCC said that if we didn&#8217;t complete all the government requirements in that 18 month window, we could request an 18 month extension.\u00a0 If, after that extension you couldn&#8217;t get your ducks in a row, well now, that&#8217;s just too bad isn&#8217;t it, and you&#8217;re out a radio station.<\/p>\n<p>It was a lot of motivation!<\/p>\n<p>First things first:\u00a0 We needed a station call sign.\u00a0 We tried and tried to find an available call sign that would go along with the idea of an audio book radio station.\u00a0 That ended up being a complete fail.<\/p>\n<p>Everybody knows I call my husband (on social media) MFH.\u00a0 MFH stands for My Favorite Husband.\u00a0 I mentioned to my husband that we should see if the initials MFH were being used by anybody within the FCC.\u00a0 Well, how about that~NOBODY was using those letters!\u00a0 Hahaha!!!\u00a0 THAT is how our radio station ended up being called WMFH-LP.<\/p>\n<p>Now that we had a station call sign, we set up an Indigo-go account in attempts to raise a little money towards purchasing a Transmitter.\u00a0 We needed a fancy box (gov&#8217;t required) that would broadcast severe weather alerts and any Presidential declared emergency kind of things.\u00a0 They were pretty high ticket items!<\/p>\n<p>One of our &#8220;rewards&#8221; for contributing to the station was one of these T~shirts! I was in charge of getting the design work done for the shirts.\u00a0 I think they came out great!\u00a0 *they&#8217;re still available on our website:\u00a0 \u00a0http:\/\/www.wmfhlp.org\/<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/?attachment_id=5550\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-5550\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-5550\" src=\"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/10006993_654802424568941_6416087837392782981_n.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"540\" height=\"960\" srcset=\"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/10006993_654802424568941_6416087837392782981_n.jpg 540w, http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/10006993_654802424568941_6416087837392782981_n-169x300.jpg 169w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 540px) 100vw, 540px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Here&#8217;s one of the video&#8217;s MFH made for the Indigo-go fund raiser.\u00a0 I loved it!<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"625\" height=\"469\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/8bXV-4YszTg?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"autoplay; encrypted-media\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>Fortunately,\u00a0 we already had our tower.\u00a0 When we first moved here, I got MFH a tower as his Christmas present.\u00a0 He had all the tower segments but needed concrete poured, guy wires purchased, nuts, bolts and lot of other knickknacks.<\/p>\n<p>Our tower is 60&#8242; but we have permission with the FCC to go up to 100&#8242;.\u00a0 We hope to eventually add that extra 40&#8242; to the tower and expand our broadcasting area.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/?attachment_id=5546\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-5546\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-5546\" src=\"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/37904228_1760633003985872_1958311980951404544_n.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"720\" height=\"960\" srcset=\"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/37904228_1760633003985872_1958311980951404544_n.jpg 720w, http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/37904228_1760633003985872_1958311980951404544_n-225x300.jpg 225w, http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/37904228_1760633003985872_1958311980951404544_n-624x832.jpg 624w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 720px) 100vw, 720px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>We did not meet our initial 18 month goal of gathering all the mandatory required equipment by the FCC so we were forced to ask for that extension.\u00a0 It was granted and we were back to work.<\/p>\n<p>Finally, we had all our equipment!\u00a0 YAY!!!\u00a0 It was time to go on the air!<\/p>\n<p>The FCC allows a little time of &#8220;practice broadcasting.&#8221;\u00a0 You broadcast&#8230;work the bugs out of the system BEFORE you notify the FCC you&#8217;re all set and ready to go 24\/7.<\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;ll never forget the day we decided to practice broadcast.\u00a0 I was afraid all the equipment would explode or something!<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/?attachment_id=5544\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-5544\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-5544\" src=\"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/giphy-1.gif\" alt=\"\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Silly really, but when you pour your soul into something for that long, you just never know what&#8217;s going to happen.\u00a0 Nothing exploded!<\/p>\n<p>Last thing on our wish list of things for the radio station was a transmitter shed.<\/p>\n<p>When all of this started, a transmitter shed wasn&#8217;t on the list.\u00a0 After a while of having all the station equipment in a spare bedroom we discovered two things:\u00a0 One~the equipment is noisy!\u00a0 Two~it generates a lot of heat!<\/p>\n<p>Between those two things, we knew we had to get the equipment out of the house.\u00a0 Last summer we began construction on the transmitter shed.\u00a0 This was a DIY project.\u00a0 We had a lot of fun building it!<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/?attachment_id=5545\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-5545\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-5545\" src=\"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/18893377_1341431072572736_8437587754287326605_n.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"598\" height=\"601\" srcset=\"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/18893377_1341431072572736_8437587754287326605_n.png 598w, http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/18893377_1341431072572736_8437587754287326605_n-150x150.png 150w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 598px) 100vw, 598px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>MFH carefully researched doing electrical stuff and wired the shed.\u00a0 We passed inspection!<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/?attachment_id=5547\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-5547\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-5547\" src=\"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/23316332_1480623468653495_718731444562869267_n.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"960\" height=\"960\" srcset=\"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/23316332_1480623468653495_718731444562869267_n.jpg 960w, http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/23316332_1480623468653495_718731444562869267_n-150x150.jpg 150w, http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/23316332_1480623468653495_718731444562869267_n-300x300.jpg 300w, http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/23316332_1480623468653495_718731444562869267_n-768x768.jpg 768w, http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/23316332_1480623468653495_718731444562869267_n-624x624.jpg 624w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 960px) 100vw, 960px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Finally the day arrived to move all the equipment into its very own home.\u00a0 It sits in there, nice and cozy and transmits audio books every day of the week, 24 hours of every day, just as happy as a clam.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/?attachment_id=5548\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-5548\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-5548\" src=\"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/26055616_1528371543878687_5916766166597752345_n.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"960\" height=\"720\" srcset=\"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/26055616_1528371543878687_5916766166597752345_n.jpg 960w, http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/26055616_1528371543878687_5916766166597752345_n-300x225.jpg 300w, http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/26055616_1528371543878687_5916766166597752345_n-768x576.jpg 768w, http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/26055616_1528371543878687_5916766166597752345_n-624x468.jpg 624w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 960px) 100vw, 960px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;ve left out soooo many of the hurdles that have been jumped&#8230;\u00a0 The Non~profit status obtained&#8230;so many things that have happened in the past 5 years.\u00a0 It&#8217;s been a huge project and such a fun project!!!<\/p>\n<p>Each day on our Radio Station FB page, MFH will post the next day&#8217;s broad cast schedule.\u00a0\u00a0https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/wmfhlp\/<\/p>\n<p>He also Tweets it on our Radio Station Twitter page:\u00a0\u00a0https:\/\/twitter.com\/wmfhlp<\/p>\n<p>Of course the daily broadcast schedule is also posted on our website along with our streaming link!\u00a0\u00a0http:\/\/www.wmfhlp.org\/<\/p>\n<p>We finally got our streaming link up and running so no matter where you live(!) you can tune in.\u00a0 How exciting is that!?!<\/p>\n<p>Streaming link:\u00a0 \u00a0http:\/\/chrishoward.gtrwireless.com:8000\/WMFHLP<\/p>\n<p>Thanks for following along on our huge 5 year adventure!\u00a0 Things are still happening.\u00a0 We&#8217;re chatting with a few legal representatives to gain permission to broadcast a few works not in the public domain (pretty much anything published earlier than 1923). We&#8217;ve never tried this before so fingers crossed!!!<\/p>\n<p>#IRun4Aiden<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/?attachment_id=5549\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-5549\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-5549\" src=\"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/43117938_10217244788702562_1446721448319123456_n-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"466\" height=\"960\" srcset=\"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/43117938_10217244788702562_1446721448319123456_n-1.jpg 466w, http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/43117938_10217244788702562_1446721448319123456_n-1-146x300.jpg 146w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 466px) 100vw, 466px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>September 23, 2013 MFH (My Favorite Husband) and I wrote up our application to the FCC (Federal Communications Commission) to be granted a low power FM radio station and that day we Incorporated our radio station: Classic Book Radio. We waited on pins and needles&#8230;waiting and waiting for the word from &#8220;on high&#8221; to see [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[21,16,19,22,6,8],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5540"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5540"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5540\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5552,"href":"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5540\/revisions\/5552"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5540"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5540"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/w0ep.us\/TM\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5540"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}