Hail and Farewell: Bill Jones, KD7S, Leaves the ARS Sojourner

As one of ARS' longest tenured and most active members, he's proven over and over to be a prolific writer, operator, designer, builder and genuine lover of amateur radio. With ARS, Bill has truly "done it all."

It is the wise man, though, who knows when to say "when." And for Bill, "when" is now.
"I celebrated my 60th birthday just over a week ago," he recently wrote to the editing staff of The ARS Sojourner. "I have decided that it's time to cut back on some of my activities and obligations. I am very sorry to say that I can no longer contribute to the pages of The ARS Sojourner except perhaps on a sporadic basis. I have enjoyed our time together and hope you will not think poorly of me for my decision, but it's something I must do."

A gentleman of the first order, we consider ourselves blessed and honored to have had KD7S on the contributing editing staff of this monthly web magazine. He will be missed.

Readers of The ARS Sojourner over the years have had a smorgasbord of provocative, interesting and downright poetic offerings from KD7S. A morsel of his legacy can be found in the magazine's archives under its cumulative index:

+ A Mini QRP Expedition
+ A Thing of Beauty: It All Started with A Tree
+ An ARS Adventure: Ham Radio and Black Holes
+ Memories of Memorial Day Weekend: Backpacking, Camping and Ham Radio at Weaver Lake
+ An Altimeter for Your Trailside Antenna
+ The HyLaunch: Build a Compact, Integrated Antenna Launching System
+ Up A Lazy Antenna: A Trial Friendly "H" for 20 Meters
+ Don't Leave Home Without Them: One-Box Portable Ham Stations
+ Keeping in Perfect Tune: A Film-Can Transmatch
+ Scavenging: The ARS Guide to Hamfest Dumpster Diving
+ Sunshine QSO
+ The TFR-40 from KD7S
+ Navigating the Wilderness Using Topographic Maps
+ Staying Found: A Book Review
+ The Sky's the Limit: Navigating the Wilderness with GPS

Continuously licensed since 1955 when he was 13-years-old, Bill Jones holds Amateur Extra class and FCC commercial licenses.

His main interests are in QRP — both CW and RTTY — homebrewing and portable operation from field locations.

He has had multiple articles published in 73 Amateur Radio Today, Ham Radio, Ham Radio Horizons, and QST magazines, the latter awarding him the ARRL's prestigious Cover Plaque award. He is also a frequent contributor to QRP Amateur Radio Club International's QRP Quarterly and Northern California QRP Club's QRPp.

An award-winning builder, Bill is widely recognized as one of QRP's top homebrewers. He lives in Sanger, CA., and is employed by the City of Fresno as a computer systems specialist.

As a journalistic colleague, Bill will be sorely missed. Fortunately, as a friend, he will be only an electronic keyer paddle, a microphone or a computer keyboard away.
The Adventure Radio Society family owes Bill a huge debt of gratitude. While he is stepping back from regular duties as a contributing editor, we hope to see his byline in The ARS Sojourner from time to time.

And we wish him all the best in his scaled-back life. He's certainly earned it.

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Richard Fisher, KI6SN, is executive editor of The ARS Sojourner. Russ Carpenter, AA7QU, is founder of the Adventure Radio Society.