So everyone knows that hams can get their callsign on their license plates (tags for you southerners). In most states and provinces. As far as I know it is something in all states but if not, I am sure someone here will know. I have had ham radio plates in both states I have lived in and most of my ham friends do also.
Some GMRS aficionados have advocated allowing GMRS licensees to also get that same privilege. As much as I like GMRS and as active in it I am (much more so than I am on the ham bands) I don’t think that is the right call to make. Hams have to take tests to obtain and upgrade their licenses while GMRS folk merely need to apply for it. Ham radio has been around since radio began and it has historically been a source for radio and electronics-trained people for the military and other public service agencies. Ham radio has also historically been active in disaster response as well as event handling. While that is lesser seen these days it still exists.
GMRS is of course also part of emergency and event management in some areas but much less so than hams. It is for these reasons that I think ham radio deserves the honor of special plates while GMRS does not.
In some states where you can choose your plates, they allow various combinations like 3 letters/4 numerals or 4 letters/3 numerals so that your GMRS callsign can be accommodated, just as a standard Personalized plate. I have had that in both Arizona and Illinois. I suppose that since GMRS callsigns are just part of the regular callsign pool used for other land mobile services one could get their business band or public safety call if available.
While I have had only one ham radio callsign in my life that I retained when I upgraded and moved to a new call area, I have had 3 GMRS callsigns. I let my first (KAE4216) lapse as I was no longer interested in GMRS at the time. I did have an Illinois license plate with that callsign at one time as Illinois allowed 3 letter/4 number plates. I later replaced it with the then current 4x3 callsign (WQDZ664) and after I moved to Arizona and got really active in a GMRS club here I got that on my license plate. It was a point of pride in the club, which I had helped start (and was the president of) and a couple other members later followed my lead and got their GMRS callsigns on their vehicles.
Stupidly, I let that callsign lapse accidentally. I got the notification from the FCC reminding me to renew my GMRS license (They used to do that) but forgot to follow up on it. When the club secretary handled my renewal they checked the FCC files and found that my call was expired. By the time it was discovered it was too late to reinstate it, so I had to get a new call. Pretty embarrassing for the club president to let his license lapse! I then replaced my state license plate with a new one with my new callsign.
Later on, after my wife was found to have breast cancer. While scary for sure, thankfully it was caught extremely early, and a minor surgery followed up by radiation got her thru the medical side of her treatment. The rest and I of our family and friends got her thru the emotional side of it and she was declared cancer-free almost 4 years ago. We saw a Breast Cancer Awareness license plate on the way to the store one day and that evening went to the DMV website and applied for one. I decided to try to get my ham radio callsign on it and was pleasantly surprised that it would be allowed here in Arizona. Illinois would not allow that combination of letters and numbers on any plate other than the Ham Radio specialty but apparently Arizona is OK with it.
It isn’t just ham radio and GMRS that are selected for license plates. I know a couple people who have had radio-related license plates, and I have had a couple myself. When I bought my first car as a teenager, I went to a currency exchange to apply for my title and registration. I was given a set of license plates over the counter; it was the one at the top of the pile. That plate was 460325. As a suburbanite in the Chicago area and a scanner user at the time I knew Chicago PD had frequencies in the UHF band but really didn’t recognize this as a scanner frequency. While it had no real meaning for me at the time I wish I would have at least retained the plate when that old Chevy was junked, I left both plates on it when it was towed away.
My best friend had the VHF frequency of the police department he worked at on his license plate; he even painted a dot in the proper place for the decimal point. Later on, he got KN3600, if you ever listened to police radio in Illinois you would recognize that as the mobile callsign for the ISPERN radio network. He also at various times had the 3x3 callsigns of the local State Police Post and a couple other radio-related calls over the years, including several of his ham radio ones (he has changed his calls a couple times when more desirable ones became available).
Another guy I knew had 155460 plates, again, Illinois scanner listeners would recognize that as a State Police channel. I have also seen “ISPERN”, “MABAS” and other Illinois channel names. I tried several times to get plates like these myself, they were either taken or assigned for distribution to banks, currency exchanges or SOS facilities. I tried to get “155475” (ISPERN in Illinois and a nationwide police interop channel), 470662 and later, when they authorized 7-digit plates, 4706625 (The police department I worked at used 470.6625) and a couple work callsigns. Other plates I tried to get included 155250, 155370, 154265 and other radio frequencies.
Another friend did get 145770, our local group used 145.770 as a simplex ham radio channel extensively and he was able to get that. He later got “CARMA95” back in 1995 in honor of our scanner club. Back in the CB days I knew of some guys that had their CB handles as vanity plates.
Another plate I was randomly assigned was “KHP822” That could have been an FCC callsign but I never was able to locate a license issued under that call. I don’t know to what service it would have been used and never found anything it could relate to.
Not all my radio-related callsigns were real. My friend sent me a replica plate with my old KAE4216 callsign as a gift. It hangs in my garage with the rest of the plates I have saved over the years.
Go to any ham fest or scanner club get-together and look for radio related license plates. While ham radio plates are common look for more subtle nods to the radio hobby. Look for other service’s callsigns, frequencies etc.
Some GMRS aficionados have advocated allowing GMRS licensees to also get that same privilege. As much as I like GMRS and as active in it I am (much more so than I am on the ham bands) I don’t think that is the right call to make. Hams have to take tests to obtain and upgrade their licenses while GMRS folk merely need to apply for it. Ham radio has been around since radio began and it has historically been a source for radio and electronics-trained people for the military and other public service agencies. Ham radio has also historically been active in disaster response as well as event handling. While that is lesser seen these days it still exists.
GMRS is of course also part of emergency and event management in some areas but much less so than hams. It is for these reasons that I think ham radio deserves the honor of special plates while GMRS does not.
In some states where you can choose your plates, they allow various combinations like 3 letters/4 numerals or 4 letters/3 numerals so that your GMRS callsign can be accommodated, just as a standard Personalized plate. I have had that in both Arizona and Illinois. I suppose that since GMRS callsigns are just part of the regular callsign pool used for other land mobile services one could get their business band or public safety call if available.
While I have had only one ham radio callsign in my life that I retained when I upgraded and moved to a new call area, I have had 3 GMRS callsigns. I let my first (KAE4216) lapse as I was no longer interested in GMRS at the time. I did have an Illinois license plate with that callsign at one time as Illinois allowed 3 letter/4 number plates. I later replaced it with the then current 4x3 callsign (WQDZ664) and after I moved to Arizona and got really active in a GMRS club here I got that on my license plate. It was a point of pride in the club, which I had helped start (and was the president of) and a couple other members later followed my lead and got their GMRS callsigns on their vehicles.
Stupidly, I let that callsign lapse accidentally. I got the notification from the FCC reminding me to renew my GMRS license (They used to do that) but forgot to follow up on it. When the club secretary handled my renewal they checked the FCC files and found that my call was expired. By the time it was discovered it was too late to reinstate it, so I had to get a new call. Pretty embarrassing for the club president to let his license lapse! I then replaced my state license plate with a new one with my new callsign.
Later on, after my wife was found to have breast cancer. While scary for sure, thankfully it was caught extremely early, and a minor surgery followed up by radiation got her thru the medical side of her treatment. The rest and I of our family and friends got her thru the emotional side of it and she was declared cancer-free almost 4 years ago. We saw a Breast Cancer Awareness license plate on the way to the store one day and that evening went to the DMV website and applied for one. I decided to try to get my ham radio callsign on it and was pleasantly surprised that it would be allowed here in Arizona. Illinois would not allow that combination of letters and numbers on any plate other than the Ham Radio specialty but apparently Arizona is OK with it.
It isn’t just ham radio and GMRS that are selected for license plates. I know a couple people who have had radio-related license plates, and I have had a couple myself. When I bought my first car as a teenager, I went to a currency exchange to apply for my title and registration. I was given a set of license plates over the counter; it was the one at the top of the pile. That plate was 460325. As a suburbanite in the Chicago area and a scanner user at the time I knew Chicago PD had frequencies in the UHF band but really didn’t recognize this as a scanner frequency. While it had no real meaning for me at the time I wish I would have at least retained the plate when that old Chevy was junked, I left both plates on it when it was towed away.
My best friend had the VHF frequency of the police department he worked at on his license plate; he even painted a dot in the proper place for the decimal point. Later on, he got KN3600, if you ever listened to police radio in Illinois you would recognize that as the mobile callsign for the ISPERN radio network. He also at various times had the 3x3 callsigns of the local State Police Post and a couple other radio-related calls over the years, including several of his ham radio ones (he has changed his calls a couple times when more desirable ones became available).
Another guy I knew had 155460 plates, again, Illinois scanner listeners would recognize that as a State Police channel. I have also seen “ISPERN”, “MABAS” and other Illinois channel names. I tried several times to get plates like these myself, they were either taken or assigned for distribution to banks, currency exchanges or SOS facilities. I tried to get “155475” (ISPERN in Illinois and a nationwide police interop channel), 470662 and later, when they authorized 7-digit plates, 4706625 (The police department I worked at used 470.6625) and a couple work callsigns. Other plates I tried to get included 155250, 155370, 154265 and other radio frequencies.
Another friend did get 145770, our local group used 145.770 as a simplex ham radio channel extensively and he was able to get that. He later got “CARMA95” back in 1995 in honor of our scanner club. Back in the CB days I knew of some guys that had their CB handles as vanity plates.
Another plate I was randomly assigned was “KHP822” That could have been an FCC callsign but I never was able to locate a license issued under that call. I don’t know to what service it would have been used and never found anything it could relate to.
Not all my radio-related callsigns were real. My friend sent me a replica plate with my old KAE4216 callsign as a gift. It hangs in my garage with the rest of the plates I have saved over the years.
Go to any ham fest or scanner club get-together and look for radio related license plates. While ham radio plates are common look for more subtle nods to the radio hobby. Look for other service’s callsigns, frequencies etc.
