Monday, September 18, 2017

Disaster Preparedness

At 7 p.m., Wednesday, September 20th, at the Corvallis High School library, Corvallis Post #91 will conduct its monthly membership meeting.
September is National Disaster Preparedness month, so this month we will discuss emergency preparedness.
This month’s guest speaker is Harry Lee from Bug Out Montana. Alex Sakariassen from the Independent recently interviewed Harry, so here is the link (https://missoulanews.bigskypress.com/missoula/are-you-prepared-for-the-end-of-the-world-as-you-know-it/Content?oid=4990504) to give you some background knowledge of our guest speaker.
Harry will be talking about “72-hour kits.” He will tell you what is in them, how to build them or where to buy one.
We are giving away two “72-hour kits,” along with other items as door prizes.
After Harry, the post’s amateur radio club, KG7SPL, will give a power point presentation on the club, emergency volunteers, and training. After the meeting stick around a listen to the Bitterroot Amateur Radio Club’s Wednesday night net.
Both presentations are open to the public. After last winter’s snow and this summer’s fires it is always good to think about “what if.” We are hoping to help our members and the public think through these situations and find some individual solutions.

Again, the meeting starts at 7 p.m. at the Corvallis High School library. Bring your family, a friend or your neighbor, because you must prepare before the emergency happens.

American Legion National Calendar

https://www.legion.org/calendar

Amateur radio growing in popularity among Legionnaires



Over its nearly 100-year history, The American Legion has fostered a number of programs that have slipped in and out of prominence but remain steadfast in their service to others. One such initiative that’s growing within the Legion is its connection to amateur radio.
The connection is a natural one. Communications training is a standard part of military service, and amateur radio offers a way to continue serving after the military, says Marty Justis, president of The American Legion Amateur Radio Club (TALARC). "Ham" networks of all kinds provide support for everything from Legion post activities to the Indianapolis Veterans Day Parade and the Boston Marathon.
Perhaps the most powerful way amateur radio can provide service is in civil defense and disaster preparedness, both of which are high priorities for the Legion. Because September is National Disaster Preparedness Month, the Legion wants departments and posts to know the importance of being ready for anything, whether that’s volunteering a post home as a community shelter during a disaster or partnering with local public safety officials. The American Legion has a longstanding memorandum of understanding with the Department of Homeland Security, which encourages local organizations to get involved in emergency communications.
Based out of American Legion National Headquarters in Indianapolis, TALARC is as a conduit to encourage more localized ham radio programs. Justis and Joe March, two longtime hams and Legion employees, came up with the idea in 2010. The following year, the Legion’s National Executive Committee approved its creation. Currently TALARC has at least 3,200 members, some in every department, and at least 30 post clubs. Bill Sloan, vice president, says TALARC is certainly one of the country’s largest ham radio clubs.
An early wish for TALARC was to set up a station at National Headquarters from which to operate communication events, or "nets." During nets, anyone on the same frequency can "check in" and make contact with net operators. An old darkroom in the building’s basement was requisitioned, a request went out to Legion hams for equipment, and the response was quick, Justis says. Today TALARC boasts antennae on the roof, amplifiers and other advanced resources. The club station is used mainly for special event stations, or nets to commemorate specific places or days, such as the Legion's birthday in March and Veterans Day in November.
The difference between a club and a station is that while a club consists of enthusiasts -- some of whom may have their own ham equipment -- a station is a more permanent operation, with its own Federal Communications Commission (FCC) call sign like those obtained by individuals. That’s what TALARC wants clubs to aim for.
The roots of amateur radio go back more than a century. Morse code is considered the first digital communication, and laid the groundwork for everything from radio to cellphones and beyond. During World War I, the War Department commissioned amateur radio operators as officers to teach it to doughboys.
As early as the 1930s, the Legion’s National Security Commission encouraged posts to form amateur radio groups in support of civil defense. A May 1939 article in the National Legionnaire reported that the Department of California had set up a Disaster and Relief Committee, with 228 stations within the state’s borders; each post was to sponsor and provide operating resources for at least one amateur station in its vicinity.
The department's commitment to amateur radio continues to this day. California was the first department to have an FCC call sign of its own. The Department of California American Legion Amateur Radio Commission is nearly 40 years old, and TALARC based much of its organization on it. Dan Curry, an Air Force veteran and chairman of the Department of California American Legion Amateur Radio Commission, travels to ham conventions across the state to "let people know who we are." He says that the recruiting goes both ways – Legionnaires to hams, and veteran hams to Legionnaires – and led to nearly 100 Legionnaires becoming hams last year.
"We would love to see other departments have it," Curry says of the commission. Other goals include encouraging students on amateur radio's STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering and Math) connections, having at least one post club in every district, and continuing to work on community disaster and emergency preparedness .
Chris Cancilla is trustee of the new post club at Walter E. Cole Post 187 in Wake Forest, N.C. He was turned on to amateur radio by his operator roommate while stationed in Texas during his time in the Air Force, and is currently climbing the licensing ladder.
The club brings together three of Cancilla's hobbies: ham radio, the Legion and the Boy Scouts (which have a long association with amateur radio, too): the result is "backflips-down-the-hallway kind of fun for me." His focus is on the training and education of anyone who wants to learn amateur radio. Membership stands at 10 certified operators, and the club is open to Scouts and the community.
Post 187 assists at many community events, such as Music in the Park, and Cancilla sees ham involvement as an asset to these activities: "Communication is an important factor in pretty much everything." The post club plans to organize a station down the road. Cancilla's favorite moment of his amateur radio career was Jamboree on the Internet, a Scouting event that utilized the EchoLink system to connect repeaters around the world using computers. Local Scouts were talking to their counterparts in Australia, and Cancilla overheard an observation shared by both sides: "Man, you sound funny." "It's a smaller world," he says.
In August 2015, Don Rand started an amateur radio club at Post 1992 in Gautier, Miss., with four other hams, a primary reason the Air Force veteran had joined the Legion just a couple of months before. The club’s purposes are running nets and emergency preparedness. Rand runs a weekly evening 80 meter net that has attracted an audience far beyond their hopes: "We soon found out that hams throughout the country wanted an evening net," he says. "We have had check-ins from Michigan, New York, North and South Carolina, Georgia, Indiana, Texas and, of course, Mississippi." They are planning a special event station for Veterans Day and more visibility in their department, including demonstrations at department meetings.
In September 2015, the club received the donation of a communications trailer by the county ham association, and the club is working on outfitting it for both every day and emergency use. "Living on the Mississippi Gulf Coast, we have constant reminders of the need for communications," Rand says. "I would like to make sure all Legion posts along the I-10 highway system know about us and our capabilities." Those include members with their own equipment and a commitment to meet the needs of the Legion and the community alike. When Hurricane Harvey pummeled Texas and the Gulf Coast in late August, Rand and his cohorts were busy making connections and relaying information.
Boyle Post 46 in Danville, Ky., took a different path to obtaining a post club: it adopted one that already existed in its community. The Wilderness Road Amateur Radio Club was founded in 1960 for county ham communities, but had lost its home in the local Red Cross building. The post offered it a place in its own building and affirmed it as a "post-approved activity." According to post commander Tony Cromwell, the post “greatly benefited by the radio club becoming part of our post, and our community image was greatly enhanced."
Cromwell himself became licensed in 1973 after leaving the Air Force. He says the post/club's long-term goal is to get a fully operational emergency communications van integrated into the communication network, and to continue to grow club membership. Cromwell calls the coupling "the post entrée into providing Legion mission support to emergency support for our communities in times of natural disasters."
Any licensed Legion Family member can join TALARC, and it only takes one person to start a club after receiving approval from post leadership. After that, it's a matter of recruiting other Legionnaire hams into the club – or creating new hams through training and education. For those interested in becoming a ham, the Legion has resources available online to help obtain an FCC amateur radio license, at www.legion.org/hamradio/resources.
Cromwell put it best in an article he wrote for a Department of Kentucky publication: "Like a diamond, The American Legion has many facets .... One of these is a mission to provide emergency communications support in communities during natural disasters."

Friday, September 15, 2017

Untold Pearl Harbor Story Revealed in New World War II Book

Thirty-three years after her dad’s death, author Liz Gilmore Williams delves into his letters and photos from World War II, seeking to solve a mystery: What caused his terrifying rages? She’d never considered his surviving the attack on Pearl Harbor. The letters lead her to uncover a spellbinding look at Hawaii’s transformation from island paradise to war zone, the bombing of Pearl Harbor, and his combat duty on other Pacific battlefields. Amid her quest, Liz stumbles upon a shocking secret that the letters also imply: Her father had waged two wars―one of them with himself. As we observe the 75th anniversary of the bombing of Pearl Harbor, No Ordinary Soldier: My Father’s Two Wars (Burkwood Media) offers an account of the war in the Pacific from the viewpoint of a signalman with the 7th Army Air Force. For more information or to order from Amazon or Barnes & Noble, go to http://www.noordinarysoldier.com/

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Fall District Uniform

The Department Commander has specified the uniform for Fall District Meetings is coat & tie; several of you have asked about the uniform since sometimes in the past the Department Commander has set the uniform as casual.
Again it is coat & tie for all Department Officers and Chairman.

Thursday, September 14, 2017

Betty L. Tudahl

BIGFORK — Betty L. Tudahl was the sixth child born to Lauritz F. and Bertha Mikkelson Ebbeson on Nov. 30, 1932, in Berthold, North Dakota. She was baptized and confirmed at Zion Lutheran Church in Berthold, North Dakota. On Sunday, Aug. 27, 2017, Betty passed away at her home in Bigfork that she loved so much.
She graduated from Berthold High School in 1950 and married Donald Tudahl in April 1953 at Zion Lutheran Church in Berthold.
Betty is survived by four children, daughters Deborah Durham of Bigfork, Susan (Randy) Holman of Bigfork, sons Dan (Debbie) Tudahl of Missoula, and Mark (Kelcy) Tudahl of Bigfork. She is also survived by her beloved grandchildren BJ (Ronda) Holman, Jamie (Casey) Jenks, Danny (Kari) Tudahl, Bradley (Cindy) Tudahl, Nikki Tudahl, Dustin McGlothlin, Donny (Kristiana) Tudahl, Jacob Tudahl, Kyle and Alex; great­-grandchildren Arena, Taylor, David, Lucy, Monty, Tatum, Tanner, Jordyn, Brittyn, Brody, Sheadyn, Khyler and Relyhk. Also surviving Betty are numerous  nieces and nephews that were very dear to her heart, as well as a host of very dear and close friends from childhood, school years and throughout her life.
Friends were a very important part of Betty's life and meant so much to her.
Betty was preceded in death by her parents, her beloved husband Don in 1989, son Bruce in 2014, brothers Harry, Don, Herman and George, sister Bernice and husband Ernie Scott, Oscar Tudahl, Gaylord and Virginia Tudahl, Carol and Norma Tudahl, Harold & Emily Holland, and special nephew Larry Ebbeson.
Betty was a dedicated member of Faith Lutheran church in Hamilton since 1970. Upon moving to Bigfork, she attended Bethel Chapel with Jim Holman as pastor. She was a member of Via deCristco, served on the church board  and was always very active with her church. She was also a member of the Corvallis American Legion Auxiliary and the Sons of Norway of Hamilton.
Betty and Don were proud of their Norwegian heritage and that they raised five 100 percent Norwegian children. Don and Betty were very involved in their children's sporting activities and rarely missed an event. They were very active with the Montana High School Rodeo and thoroughly enjoyed working with the kids.
Don and Betty bought the home that Don grew up in, a farm in North Dakota, and they lived there until 1967 when they moved  to Montana. After Don's passing, Betty sold their five-acre farm in Corvallis and moved to Hamilton in 2000 and then settled in Bigfork in 2005 to be closer to family. She loved her flowers, gardening, and working in her yard.
Betty was employed at Citizens State Bank in Hamilton for 25 years before retiring and she then traveled a bit. She was very proud of her children, their spouses and the grandchildren. She loved it when they all came home so that she could cook for them.
Services for Betty will be at Faith Lutheran Church, 171 Lewis Lane in Hamilton on Thursday, Sept. 21, at 1 p.m. with burial to follow at Corvallis Cemetery beside her beloved husband, Don. A reception will follow at Faith Lutheran Church.
A memorial will also take place in Bigfork on Friday, Sept. 22, at 3 p.m. at the Montana Ranch, 301 Echo Lake Road, Bigfork.

John E. 'Jack' Buker

VICTOR — John E. "Jack" Buker, 76, of Victor, passed away on Monday, Sept. 4, 2017. Our dad, brother, uncle, grandfather and friend met his match while doing what needed to be done and what he loved to do at the Buker Ranch, every day with his loyal companion, Scooter.
Jack was preceded in death by his wife Shirley and his parents, John and Dorothy. He is survived by his sisters, Kay Neal and Patty Buker, son James Buker, daughters Cristi Lamb, Yvette Buker, Jacque Buker and Clarissa Patzer and their families including 11 grandchildren and six great-grandchildren.
A celebration of Jack’s life will be held at 1 p.m., Saturday, Sept. 16, at the Buker Ranch, 336 Curlew Orchard Road, Victor. Please bring your Ranger Jack stories. BBQ provided, side dishes welcome. Ranch casual attire, please. Condolences and memories may be shared with the family at whitesittfuneralhome.com
Directions:
Turn west on to Bell Crossing West at the intersection of Highway 93 and Bell Crossing
Turn right onto Curlew Orchard Rd
336 Curlew Orchard Road in on the right