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Richard W. Ehrhorn Forest, VA QCWA # 09233 |
Richard William Ehrhorn, W4EA, passed away on June 26, 2022. An ARRL Life Member, Ehrhorn was first licensed in 1947 and founded Signal/One. He and Eugene Chenette, N5YJ (SK), designed, manufactured, and marketed the then state-of-the-art, high-end Signal/One CX7 multiband transceiver in the late 1960s. He also founded Ehrhorn Technological Operations, Inc. and was Chairman of Alpha/Power, Inc.
He graduated from the University of Minnesota in 1955 with a BS in Electrical Engineering, and in 1958 he received his MS in Electrical Engineering from the California Institute of Technology.
Ehrhorn was a licensed amateur radio operator for over 70 years, an ARRL Life Member, and throughout his career in radio technology, was well known for designing and building RF amplifiers.
In his QRZ database biography, Ehrhorn wrote about his respect and competitiveness with Art Collins, founder of the Collins Radio Company in 1933. "I always had aimed to replicate in a small way Art Collins' success: build the finest ham radio gear and -- someday -- government and/or industrial customers would 'discover' us," Ehrhorn wrote. Then in 1983, Ehrhorn was invited by General Electric Medical Systems to design a linear RF amplifier to work with their new magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) technology.
Ehrhorn retired to Forest, Virginia, where Brian Justin, WA1ZMS, began to know Ehrhorn and his work in more detail. "He was a man of a lot of firsts and high-water marks," said Justin. "His claim to fame was certainly the development [of] the Alpha Series RF power amplifiers that made their way into medical technology."
Justin added that Ehrhorn, in his later years, was still active in amateur radio, especially on the HF bands. On his move to a new location, Ehrhorn wrote, "New QTH, 58 acres with a broad hilltop 0.2 miles high! We still can see for miles in all directions. And I finally have room for decent 75 - 80 and 160-meter antennas. Better late than never." Several years ago, a tornado barely missed Ehrhorn's house, leaving his towers and antennas intact.
Amateur radio drove Richard Ehrhorn's passions and creativity throughout his career.