ARRLWeb: Radio Club of America Honors Cronkite, Bodson, Belrose; Cronkite Receives ARRL Presidential Award

RCA Fellow Ted Rappaport, PhD, N9NB, presents ARRL Roanoke Division Director Dennis Bodson, W4PWF, with the prestigious Sarnoff Citation at the 98th Annual Radio Club of America banquet in November. The Sarnoff Citation recognizes significant contributions to the advancement of electronic communications. Barry Goldwater, K7UGA (SK), was the first recipient of the Sarnoff Citation in 1973. [Photo courtesy Irving Ives Photography]

Richard Somers, W6NSV, presents Walter Cronkite, KB2GSD, with the Armstrong Medal, the RCA’s foremost achievement award and named for its first recipient, Major Edwin Armstrong. [Photo courtesy Irving Ives Photography]

RCA Vice President Marty Cooper presented Jack Belrose, VE2CV, with the second Armstrong Medal of the evening. [Photo courtesy Irving Ives Photography]

ARRL Hudson Division Director presented Cronkite with the ARRL President’s Award. Cronkite was awarded this honor in 2005 in recognition of his outstanding support of the ARRL and Amateur Radio by narrating the videos Amateur Radio Today and The ARRL Goes to Washington. [Photo courtesy Frank Fallon, N2FF]

Cronkite receives the ARRL Presidential Award from Fallon at the 98th annual Radio Club of America banquet. [Don Bishop, W0WO, Photo]

ARRL Hudson Director Frank Fallon, N2FF, congratulates RCA Sarnoff Citation recipient ARRL Roanoke Division Director Dennis Bodson, W4PWF. [Photo courtesy Frank Fallon, N2FF]

At the 98th annual Radio Club of America (RCA) banquet on November 16 in New York City, Walter Cronkite, KB2GSD; ARRL Roanoke Division Director Dennis Bodson, PhD, PE, W4PWF, and Jack Belrose, VE2CV, were toasted and feted throughout the night. Bodson received the Sarnoff Citation, given to recognize significant contributions to the advancement of electronic communications. Barry Goldwater, K7UGA (SK), was the first recipient of the Sarnoff Citation in 1973. Both Cronkite and Belrose received the Armstrong Medal, the RCA’s foremost achievement award and named for its first recipient, Major Edwin Armstrong. The keynote speech was given by Andy Rooney of television’s 60 Minutes.

According to RCA Director-Elect Don Bishop, W0WO, Cronkite and Rooney both attended the latter part of cocktail reception that preceded the banquet. Cronkite sat in an elevated chair to greet RCA members and guests in a receiving line and Rooney sat at a small table where the occasional visitor might approach to offer greetings. “The focus was on Cronkite, who enjoyed shaking hands with his admirers and exchanging a few words with them,” Bishop said.

After the dinner, RCA Fellow Ted Rappaport, PhD, N9NB, came to the podium to present the Sarnoff Citation to Bodson. Rappaport said, “It is my honor to present this year’s Sarnoff Citation. It isn’t given every year. It was initiated in 1973, and it is given to one individual who has made significant contributions to the advancement of electronics. This year’s recipient is Dennis Bodson. Dennis has dedicated his career to standardizing the electronics industry. His efforts in standards, which were required to allow components made by all manufacturers to interact with one another, were recognized by the IEEE with the Charles Proteus Steinmetz Award. We’re honored to have with us Dennis Bodson to receive this citation. I asked him, given his amazing contributions amongst the many he has made technically, what was the key to his success. He said a key to his success was his wife of 42 years, Rita, who is with him tonight.”

Bodson received the citation and responded: “As I look back through my career to identify highlights as anyone might do with their own careers, it is never a singular thing one sees. There are many others who help you to achieve. To those, I also thank them. I also have a special thanks to my family and to my wife Rita, because without their cooperation and support, I wouldn’t have been able to accomplish much of anything. Thank you, Rita, and thank you to the Radio Club of America.”

Richard Somers, W6NSV, presented Cronkite with the Armstrong Award. Somers said, “Each year, the Radio Club of America recognizes outstanding achievement in the field of wireless communications by honoring individuals who have made significant contributions to the industry and the public it serves. The highest and most prestigious award given by the Club is the Armstrong Medal, created in 1935 and named after Major Edwin Armstrong, wireless pioneer and inventor of FM radio. Since that time, this award has been presented infrequently and only to the most accomplished and deserving individuals -- those who have made important contributions to the radio art and science. As his significant contribution, our award recipient has used the medium of television to keep the American public informed of the news in a manner never before imagined. And tonight, we have the distinct privilege of having that individual with us, America’s best known and most respected broadcast journalist, Walter Cronkite.”

When Somers was done with his speech, Cronkite stepped to the podium and Somers handed him the award. Cronkite simply said: “Thank you for accepting me as one of you and for your accomplishments in the field of communications.”

RCA Vice President Marty Cooper then stepped to the podium and presented a second Armstrong Medal to John S. “Jack” Belrose, PhD, VE2CV. “As Richard said, the Armstrong Medal was first awarded in 1935 and has been awarded 40 times since then. Not long after it was first awarded, our next awardee went to work at the Communications Research Centre in Canada, John Belrose. Jack worked at the Communications Research Centre for 55 years and still works there today but he rose to become the director of the Radiosciences Branch. He was educated in Canada and got his PhD in Cambridge. He has participated in numerous Canadian and international standards and technical groups. He has written more than 125 articles and papers on the subject of radioscience and antennas and propagation. For your lifetime of important communications, it is my pleasure to present you with the Armstrong Medal,” Cooper said.

Belrose responded: “It was noted that candidates for the Armstrong Medal are restricted to Club members since, in 1937, everyone who was anyone in radio was a member of the Club. We can’t say that nowadays, but it shows the prestige that our Club once had. Professor Hazeltine, the first recipient in 1937, said Edwin H. Armstrong is the patron saint of our Club, and certainly it was true. Armstrong made it a practice to make his first declaration of his inventions before the Club. Seven out of 26 important papers were published in our Proceedings. He was president from 1916 to 1920, and he was one of the six-member team that designed, constructed and operated the Amateur Radio station 1BCG that successfully transmitted a 12 word message across the Atlantic from Greenwich, Connecticut to Ardrossan, Scotland on December 11, 1921. Thank you for giving me the Armstrong Medal. When I look at it, I will think perhaps I did contribute something, rather than nothing, to the book of knowledge.”

Before the banquet and ceremony, ARRL Hudson Division Director Frank Fallon, N2FF, presented Cronkite with the ARRL President’s Award. This award, created in 2003 by the ARRL Board of Directors, recognizes an ARRL member or members who “have shown long-term dedication to the goals and objectives of ARRL and Amateur Radio” and who have gone the extra mile to support individual League programs and goals. Cronkite was selected to receive the award in April 2005 “in recognition of his outstanding support of the ARRL and Amateur Radio by narrating the videos Amateur Radio Today and The ARRL Goes to Washington.”

“It was quite a thrill to make this presentation to Cronkite,” Fallon said. “He has long been recognized as the ‘most trusted man in America,’ so lining our causes to his face, name and voice has been a great help.”

Fallon said that this is only the third time the award has been given and second time a ham residing in the Hudson Division has been given the Award: “The first award went to Jerry Agliata, W2GLA, who received the award in 2004 at the Hudson Division Awards Dinner for his longtime involvement in legislative efforts in New York State on behalf of amateurs. The second time was presented to Mary Ann Crider, WA3HUP, in 2005 for her contributions to the cause of international goodwill through her long service as QSL Manager and Manager of the ARRL Third Call Area Incoming QSL Bureau.”