YASME Foundation
| YASME Foundation | |
|---|---|
| Founded | 1959, in Tampa, Florida |
| Founders | A group led by Dick Spenceley, KV4AA, its first president |
| Type | Nonprofit 501(c)(3) foundation run by a volunteer board |
| Mailing address | Castro Valley, California |
| History | |
| Original purpose | Funding Danny Weil's DXpeditions |
| Later expeditions | Lloyd Colvin, W6KG, and Iris Colvin, W6QL |
| Activities | Grants for amateur radio projects, youth programs and developing countries |
| Award | Yasme Excellence Award, since 2008 |
| Today | |
| Website | yasme.org |
The YASME Foundation is a US nonprofit that supports scientific and educational projects in amateur radio around the world.[1] It began in 1959 as a way to fund the sailing expeditions of Danny Weil, a British yachtsman who put rare islands on the air from his boats, all named Yasme. Later it sponsored the decades of travel of Lloyd and Iris Colvin. Today it makes grants, with a particular interest in young people and in amateur radio in developing countries,[1] and gives an award for outstanding contributions to the hobby.
Danny Weil
Danny Weil was born in London in 1918 into a family of watchmakers and served in the Royal Air Force before taking over the family shop.[2] Restless, he restored a wrecked 40-foot sailboat, named it Yasme and set off alone from England in August 1954 to sail around the world.[2]
In the Virgin Islands in 1955 he met Dick Spenceley, KV4AA, a well-known DXer, who helped him learn radio theory and Morse code, gathered donated equipment from American hams, and saw him licensed as VP2VB.[3] From then on Weil's voyages doubled as DXpeditions, trips to put rare places on the air for the many hams trying to contact as many countries as possible (see DXing). Late in 1955 he reached Tahiti, where he operated as FO8AN, and he later operated from Canton Island in the Pacific.[3]
The sea was hard on his boats. The first Yasme was wrecked on a Pacific coral reef, its replacement was destroyed by an explosion in a Scottish harbor in 1957, and another was lost on rocks off Union Island in the Grenadines in April 1959.[4] Between those losses he worked a string of Caribbean islands in 1958 and 1959, just as changes to the DXCC country rules made many of them count separately.[4] From 1960 he sailed Yasme III out of Tampa, with operations including Bajo Nuevo and Clipperton Island.[5][6] He retired from DXpeditioning in 1963 and died in San Antonio, Texas, in 2003.[2]
The foundation
To pay for Weil's travels, Spenceley and a group of prominent amateurs organized the Yasme Foundation under Florida law, with a charter approved in July 1959.[2] Weil himself was one of the directors. Its stated purposes included advancing amateur radio and promoting international goodwill.[2] Spenceley raised money from DXers and reported on the voyages in a newsletter, The Yasme News.[7]
Lloyd and Iris Colvin
After Weil retired, Lloyd Colvin, W6KG, and his wife Iris Colvin, W6QL, carried on under the foundation's banner, beginning in 1965, with their "Yasme Round the World DX-Pedition."[8] They operated for almost 30 years from, by the foundation's count, more than 200 DXCC countries.[7] Yasme volunteers handled their QSL cards, sending out hundreds of thousands of them.[7] Lloyd died in December 1993 while on an expedition in Turkey,[8] and Iris died in 1998.[9] A substantial bequest from the Colvins' estate in 1998 has helped fund the foundation's work since then.[7]
The story of both expeditions is told in a book by James D. Cain, K1TN, YASME: The Danny Weil and Colvin Radio Expeditions, which the foundation offers as a free download.[10]
Grants and awards today
The foundation is run by a volunteer board of directors. It makes grants to projects it judges will help amateur radio flourish. Recent examples listed in its news releases include:
- receivers and equipment for Reverse Beacon Network nodes, many in Africa and on remote islands;
- support for Youngsters On The Air (YOTA) camps in several countries, and for youth operators on DXpeditions;
- licensing, training and club projects in countries such as Ethiopia, Malawi and the Seychelles;
- donations to scholarship programs of the ARRL Foundation and the Foundation for Amateur Radio;
- support for the World Radiosport Team Championship and for HamSCI, a group linking hams with scientific research.[11]
The Yasme Excellence Award, created in 2008, is given from time to time to individuals, teams or organizations for technical, operating or organizational achievement.[12] It usually consists of an engraved crystal globe and a cash award.[12] Past recipients have included software developers, propagation researchers, educators, youth mentors and disaster-response volunteers. The foundation also sponsors operating awards for contacts with stations using Yasme call signs.[13]
See also
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 The Yasme Foundation, Yasme Foundation.
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 Danny Weil: DXer and Dreamer, Yasme Foundation.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 Learning amateur radio and becoming a country-hopping DXpeditioner, Yasme Foundation.
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 New beginning, new Yasme, new countries and new hope, Yasme Foundation.
- ↑ New boat with Yasme Foundation, new start and new everything and more, Yasme Foundation.
- ↑ Arriving in Clipperton Island was no picnic, Yasme Foundation.
- ↑ 7.0 7.1 7.2 7.3 About Us, Yasme Foundation.
- ↑ 8.0 8.1 W6KG 1915 – 1993, Quarter Century Wireless Association.
- ↑ YASME: The Danny Weil and Colvin Radio Expeditions, James D. Cain, K1TN, YASME Foundation.
- ↑ The Yasme Book, Yasme Foundation.
- ↑ News Releases, Yasme Foundation.
- ↑ 12.0 12.1 Yasme Excellence Awards, Yasme Foundation.
- ↑ Operating Awards, Yasme Foundation.
External links
- The Yasme Foundation, official website