Callbook and Callsign FAQ
During World War II, when all amatuer radio operation was shut down in the United States, some issues of the callbook were skipped. The last one published was Spring 1942, which apparently came out after Pearl Harbor, and would have been the only issue in Volume 23. The next issue was Spring 1946 (V24N1), the first post-war issue. I'd love to get a copy of Spring 1942.
Callbooks published prior to 1960 included both US and all foreign stations, published in the same volume. As the number of hams worldwide increased, this became unwieldy, and the book was separated into two volumes. Initially, starting in 1960, this was US in one book, and Foreign in a second book. This continued for about 25 years. In 1985, the split was changed to North America (including US, Canada, Mexico, central America, and the Caribbean) and DX (outside of North America).
The first few years, at least until 1926, there were two books published per year. By 1928, they were up to four books per year. This publishing schedule was maintained up through the Winter 71-72 issue. Starting then, only one full book was published per year (the Winter edition) and the quarterly printings were simply updates to the Winter book. Initially, the update issues only included changes within the previous quarter. In 1979, the updates became cumulative--for example, the Summer edition included all changes since Winter, including what had already been published in the Spring.
Quarterly updates continued through 1985. Starting in 1986, there was only one update published each year (in the summer). And 1996 was the first year that "free online updates" were available. This was a dial-up modem service, direct to a phone number in New Jersey.
The last paper Flying Horse callbook was the 1997 edition. After this, only CD-ROMs were published, and purchasers could access the company's web site for online updates. The proliferation of online services (including the FCC's Universal Licensing System) providing callsign lookups on the internet has presumably reduced the viability of selling Callbook CD-ROMs.
The Winter 2003 edition was the last Flying Horse callbook CD published by the Radio Amateur Callbook company, and the story of the demise of the callbook received wide distribution. (The ARRL web site story on this can be found here.) Recently, a German firm purchased the name and rights to continue publishing the callbook CDs in the future. The ARRL web site story on this transaction can be found here.
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