W3CDQ 1898 - 1989

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Elizabeth M. 'Liz' Zandonini Washington, DC QCWA # 924 Chapters 23, 120 and 150

First Call: 3CDQ in 1922

Elizabeth M Zandonini, 90, a retired radio aide with the National Bureau of Standards who had been an amateur radio operator for more than 70 years, died of cancer May 16 at Sibley Memorial Hospital. She lived in Washington.

Miss Zandonini was born in New York City. She was brought to the Washington area as an infant and had attended American University. During World War I, she earned a commerical radio license.

After the war, she used her radio training to teach Morse code to hospitalized veterans at Fort Meade and Fort McHenry in Baltimore. For more than 70 years, Miss Zandonini using the call letters, W3CDQ, had talked to other amateur radio operators around the world.

She joined the Bureau of Standards in 1921, and worked in the central radio propagation laboratory. She retired in 1965.


There are no immediate survivors.

Burial: Prospect Hill Cemetery, Washington, DC.

Fluent in Italian, Spanish, French, German and English, she was an accomplished designer of electronic equipment.

Considered one of the most skilled radio operators in Washington, DC, where she lived her whole life.