Got Log?

"What's the farthest people have heard stations?" was asked on the I Love AM Radio Facebook group last week.

My AM radio log has WWL on 870 kc from New Orleans as my farthest station at 1256 miles. But then I recalled hearing a station back in the 1960s that was farther away: the CIA's Radio Americas on Swan Island in the southwest Caribbean Sea, 1800 miles from my home. I could not recall the frequency of Radio Americas, but I had their QSL card handy, so I checked the card and 1160 kc was the answer. 

Then it occurred to me that I did not have a log of the stations (AM, FM, TV and shortwave) I heard before I got my ham license in 1969. I am sure I kept a log ― how else could I keep track of the stations I tried to QSL? But I have no recollection of that log and I did not have a copy of such a log anywhere in my radio archives.

So I took the fistful of the pre-WA1LOU QSL cards and letters I had on hand and built a log from the information contained on those QSLs. It was an interesting exercise and I will blog about it in the next post.