Be Sure to Check in at Ham Radio Station K4MIE When You Visit.
It’s never a bad time to start figuring out plans for your next summer vacation. Hams interested in learning more about America’s long history of electronic communications—including amateur radio—are in luck.
A newly opened museum in Huntsville, Alabama, looks to preserve the origins of the electronic communication age and track its future. Called the Signals Museum of Information Explosion (Signals Museum for short), its goal is to highlight the work and achievements of pioneers who laid the foundation for the digital communication technologies used today.
“Our vision is to educate and inspire visitors and the world by bringing the magnificent history of communication technology to life,” said Marcus Bendickson, the founder of the museum. “[We also wanted to] highlight the scientists, engineers, and business leaders who made our connected information world possible.”
There are around 2,000 artifacts on display at the museum, almost all of which are operational. This includes about 1,000 radios, both commercial and amateur; telegraphs; televisions; computers; and cellphones. There will also be offshoot displays showing the tech that contributed to each era of communications. All told, there are about eight sections of communication represented, according to Bendickson.
The museum offers a variety of ways visitors can learn about the growth of this technology, including interactive displays, guided tours, and 3D technology highlighting the importance of the equipment on display. An audio library with literature on communications is also available.
One of the exhibits that has us here at OnAllBands excited is the working ham radio shack, K4MIE. What makes it special, outside of the fact that it’s a working station, is that it highlights the history of ham radio through a collection of vintage gear that helped establish it as a popular form of communication. Its goal is to highlight the accelerating evolution of ham radio technology and offer the public a graphic example that ham radio is still a vital and increasingly popular means of communication.
The shack is active on 20 meters through 23cm in CW, SSB, FT8, APRS, and Winlink, with FM on 2 meters through 23cm.
Aside from the vintage gear, we’re told that the shack uses Flex 6600, Icom IC-9700, and Yaesu FTM-500 transceivers. Some of these items were donated from estates of Silent Keys, but much of it was funded from an Amateur Radio Digital Communications foundation grant that assisted in putting together the museum and shack.
Charles Lewis, N4NM, a volunteer at the museum who has been helping with the station, says K4MIE includes coax, fittings, tools, and a Yeasu G-1000A rotator ordered from DX Engineering.
The classic and antique gear in the shack is 95% operational. Features of the station include switch-selectable speaker outputs and antenna ports. Older equipment is labeled with a brief description displaying year-of-manufacture, original price, and historical significance.
Beyond being an exhibit to educate curious non-hams about amateur radio, K4MIE will also serve as a hub for the region’s amateur radio clubs. Further, the museum plans to hold classes on radio operation and building, and host Morse code camps and other activities.
Even before the museum opened, K4MIE was already being used regularly by various local civic organizations needing a meeting place with an inviting environment, and by both the Huntsville Amateur Radio Club and the North Alabama DX Club for their weekly meetings, according to Bendickson.
Bendickson personally collected every artifact on display over the course of 45 years. He tells us that he got interested in collecting this equipment when he bought an Allied Kit Radio and a five-band receiver when he was younger.
“Soon, I got into telegraphs and telephones,” Bendickson said. “Eventually, I went off to college and became an electrical engineer.”
Bendickson is the former CEO of Dynetics, a high-technology, engineering, IT, and scientific services and solutions provider to government and commercial customers in the national security, cybersecurity, space, and critical infrastructure industries.
Before that, he was employed there as a radar engineer, eventually working his way up to the top spot. Under his leadership, Dynetics became the second-largest employee-owned company in Alabama.
He tells us he wanted to locate the museum in Huntsville because of its roots in technology, serving as the home to multiple companies like Boeing, Blue Origin, and Lockheed Martin. He wanted a way to show children and engineering hopefuls the importance of the electronic communications field and inspire them to pursue it.
“I wanted to be able to tell the story to these young engineers and children of how this technology evolved and what lessons we learned from them,” Bendickson said. “It was also important for me to inspire children in the area to go into the field of electronic communications. We aren’t getting enough people going into fields like this, so I wanted to get them excited.”
So, if you’re planning your next trip and want to go somewhere unique, check out the Signals Museum. It’s located at 1806 University Drive NW in Huntsville. Admission is $15 for adults 18 to 59, $12 for children 6 to 17, and $13 if you’re 60 and over.
If you visit, be sure to send OnAllBands photos and let us know what you thought! Start thinking about a visit when you come down for the 2025 Huntsville Hamfest, Aug. 16-17. Until then, enjoy a preview and many more details at the Signals Museum website.
