It's now about a week before Field Day 2025 at our Ensor Park and Museum site. This is primarily a social event, and I encourage everyone to come visit with your fellow club members, enjoying all of the activities that will be taking place. Everyone is welcome, for whatever time you have, to help set up, operate, or simply stop by to observe and provide encouragement and cheers. This is a time when amateur radio comes together to highlight our many roles in emergency response capabilities for the general public. This is a great opportunity to learn about and see the new digital modes in action, as well as antennas many of us only dream of having at home. We aim to have easy-access stations to operate on the porch, under pop-up canopies, or in the air-conditioned trailer, all surrounded by lawn chairs and good conversation.

     The Santa Fe Amateur Radio Club from Olathe will be hosting the 2025 ARRL Field Day event at Ensor Park and Museum located at 18995 W 183rd St, Olathe, KS 66062. The park is where the Marshall Ensor homestead was located during his life and while he was a teacher at Olathe High School, now Olathe North High School.

    The ARRL Field Day event will be on June 28 and June 29, 2025. The operators will begin making contacts on Saturday at 1pm, June 28 and will operate until Sunday at 1pm, June 29.  

     Larry Hall KDØRIU and Jim Andera KØNK will be organizing the club FD event this year. Please consider helping us get the antennas and equipment set up on Friday and Saturday mornings and operating for a time this year on Saturday afternoon, Saturday evening and Sunday until 1pm.

     The public is invited to visit the park and see the radio operators make contacts in North America and also foreign countries which are called DX stations.

     See the Club Calendar for for additional details.

Some of the team had to leave early, but those who remained to the end got in on a group picture in front of a sod roof building. Jeff is behind the camera.

       With a light north wind and mostly clear skies, the SFTARC’s annual mini-DXpidtion to the Tallgrass Prairie National Preserve was among the most pleasant we have ever had. Not only was the weather pleasant, but we had the most SFTARC participants ever. A total of 14 club members participated in this May 17th event! For several participants, this was their first Parks-on-the-Air event from the Tallgrass (POTA designator US-3673).

     Starting early on Saturday morning, about eight cars departed Gardner at 6:00 am to form a convoy down I-35 to Emporia, then west to eventually arrive at the Tallgrass just north of Strong City, KS. Other members met the convoy at the Tallgrass or at a breakfast stop.

      Operators rotated in and out of the various operating and logging positions. Three laptops supported logging with N3FJP AC-Log software; Icom radios were prevalent. An IC-706 provided for phone operation on 20m gathering 32 QSO. On 40m, operators of the IC-7300 station struggled with propagation, making just 1 or 2 QSOs. An IC-746 brought in 24 QSOs on 30m and 1 on 17m. The ionosphere simply did not allow the higher bands to work. A mix of vertical antennas and an end-fed 40m HW antenna along with a 30m dipole served as our antenna farm. The final log showed 58 contacts, several being POTA Park-2-Park.

       For lunch, we had more pizza delivered than the 14 participants could eat. Our time at the Tallgrass is considered volunteer hours by the National Park Service and we entered our service hours in the park’s Volunteer Log. As always, we were welcomed and appreciated by Ranger Heather.

     The convoy stopped at Braum’s in Emporia for a bit of ice cream on the way home. You might call that stop “Icing on the cake,” topping off a very pleasant day.

     Those SFTARC members that participated in 2025 were, Mike Stewart, Trig Morley, Larry Hall, George McCarville, Greg Wolfe, Ben Rocke, Robert Orr, Jason Gaumer, Rex Gaumer, Bob Davidson, Jeff Darby, Zach Brittan, Tom Brittan and Jim Andera.  

Click here to see Tall Grass 2025 Pictures

Thanks to Jeff, KS0JD, for the photos.

      Sometime in May, May being a month during which members of JCRAC are supposed to serve as tour guides for Ensor Park and Museum, John took it upon himself to lovingly repair the suitable-for-a-desk sign, which was missing most of the letter "E" and had an "R" with a broken leg. Apparently displaying a fair amount of patience - master woodworker Marshall Ensor, W9BSP would have been proud of him - John ably rebuilt the "E" and reconnected the angled leg of the "R" to the rest of the letter - Marshall would have been doubly proud of him - to basically make the sturdy old sign "as good as new," as they say. Then he applied a new coat of gold paint to the whole thing to really make it shine!

     Throughout June, June being a month during which members of our club are expected to lead tours at Ensor Park and Museum, visitors to the 40-acre historic site along 183rd Street will encounter the refurbished sign in the north room of the peg barn, where it sits atop a display case for model cars. Easily overlooked perhaps, the sign may lack the overall appeal to the eye of the 1937 electronic scoreboard Marshall constructed for the gym at Olathe High School or Bill McCabe's yoke for oxen that dates back to 1875, but it's a great addition to the room, that's for sure.