Hey good buddy, who all here remembers the chicken band craze of the 1970's?
Long before the internet there was another networking craze called CB radio. It lasted through pretty much the entire 70's. I got my start around 1970ish with a pair of GE Recon Walkie Talkies, later graduating to a 23 channel JC Penny Pinto Base Station xmas of 74. By then everyone and their uncle didn't have a CB so channels were clear and 40-50 mile contacts were common with 4 watts. I waited for my required CB license to show up before I made contacts.
By '76 the full on craze was underway, every home, car had CB's, even my dad had a CB in his car by then which he sometimes used to wake me up early as he headed to work (yep, I kept it on overnight😋
. CB's were in the movies, songs, TV shows. As a teen I was still enjoying mine, talking to friends, making new friends but I also got my ham radio license that year and sold my trusty base station, which sold fast as radios were in high demand.
Was flipping through an old 1976 CB Times magazine this morning, one of the many CB mags that sprung up during that time, & wanted to share a bit from a letter to the editor:
"I'm writing this in a diner just off Radar Alley (Interstate 90) and my reffer's sittin outside while I relax over a cuppa hundred mile joe, I'm still chuckling over what a smokey pulled in Pennsylvania a hundred & fifty miles ago. I was on the hammer with a good buddy on my front door giving me an 'all clear' so we were both making time........"
he goes on telling about a cop pretending to be a trucker giving other truckers the ok to speed then pulling them over down the highway, those were the days.
= new reply since forum marked as read
...I heard a conversation between some truckers talking about a speed trap being run from inside an unmarked van or trailer. I think it was in the Breezewood area.
Years ago I worked for a DoD contractor. This was a great place with some great people. The only real issues were the cafeteria coffee was so-so along with a limited variety of lunch options and... the piped in music. You see certain older folks with lots of seniority working in manufacturing had a special affinity for this one radio station that seemed to be limited to a selection of 9 songs that could all be accurately characterized as OLD SAD LOVE SONGS.
Since our lab was next to the metrology lab where the radio receiver lived, we could sometimes get away with changing the station or just turning the receiver off. This was a possibility during the week when everyone was in and lots of folks were around. On a weekend when attendance was sparse, metrology was often locked up. When it was open, access was much more noticeable.
One Saturday after arriving at 7AM and working for about 6 hours with some others in my department, we were stopping for lunch and in total misery over the PA/radio issue. One of our technicians looked up from his roast beef on rye. He looked back and forth from me to my friend Mark. You could almost see the light bulb over his head. We worked in the test lab. The system the company was producing was a radio jamming system.
Most Saturdays after that we were able to have lunch in peace and quiet. 
Should have taken an hour and a half. Of course she used her CB to get help. 
on the CB than on the phone at times 
One in our kitchen, the other in the car. Our whole family had "handles" (nicknames) and would go on there and talk to various truckers. We kids thought it was so cool. My handle was Bugs Bunny. 
