G3RLZ (Conisbro’) Meets PAoAP

August 1965

G3RLZ (Conisbro’) Meets PAoAP.

It is just a year since G3RLZ in Conisbrough established contact with PAoAP in Holland and after 12 months of weekly two-hour conversations in code, a meeting has taken place.

G3RLZ in Conisbrough butcher Mr. Bill Waterhouse, of 23, Minneymoor Lane, a radio ‘ham’.

First Visit.

PAoAP is Dutch radio ‘ham’ Peter Bonten, who made his first visit to England this week with his wife Thea to stay with Mr. Waterhouse, and his wife Marjorie.

Mrs. Waterhouse told the ‘South Yorkshire Times’ on Wednesday, ‘My husband started regular contact with Mr. Bonten about a year ago. Now they contact each other between 11.30 and 1.30 every Sunday. We have also exchanged lots of letters and photographs.

‘It was Peter who originally suggested that we should go over to Holland, but they have come over here instead, and we shall return the visit next year.’

In Wartime.

Mr. Bonten, a steelworker in the town of Venlo, built his first radio receiver during the wartime German occupation to pick up Radio Oranje, broadcasting from London.

He said, ‘We used to make the receivers with parts from aeroplanes – mainly British and American – shot down over Holland. My interest developed after the war when I was in the Dutch Air Force from 1948 to ‘1951, and I got my first transmitting licence about four years ago. Since then I’ve contacted all parts of the world.’

Mrs. Waterhouse explained her husband’s particular interest in the part of Holland where the Bonten’s live.

At Arnhem.

She said, ‘Venlo is only about 60 miles from Arnhem, where my husband was one of the paratroopers, 1944. Many of his friends are buried in Arnhem Cemetery.

Since he received his first licence to transmit about three years ago, Mr. Waterhouse has contacted all parts of the world, including Russia, Germany, France, Sweden, and America.

Mr. and Mrs. Bonten, who return home on Monday, have been impressed by their first visit to this country, especially by the road traffic. ‘We have found drivers are much more polite of English roads than in our country,’ Mr. Bonten added.