The well-known ham station of the late Senator Barry Goldwater, K7UGA, is being donated to the Arizona Historical Society for display as a museum exhibit. The Society plans to set up the massive station console and equipment “as the late Senator used it,” said Reba Wells Grandrud, director of the Society’s Central Arizona Division.

Grandrud said that current plans call for the K7UGA station equipment and console to be moved from the Goldwater home in Paradise Valley, Arizona, and reassembled at the Society’s museum in Papago Park in Tempe sometime during the next year. Details are still being worked out. “We’re just delighted,” Grandrud said. “We felt it was very appropriate to have this here.”

Goldwater’s station and massive antenna system were used to complete thousands of phone patch messages for troops during the Vietnam War. The antennas have been dismantled and sold, and will not be a part of the museum exhibit.

The museum intends to display the station intact and hopes to recreate the look and feel of the original Goldwater ham shack through the use of digital photographic techniques. “Our plan is probably to recreate a room just as he had it,” including all of Goldwater’s photographs and other memorabilia, Grandrud said. While it’s unlikely the station itself would be operational, she said the museum might “simulate” an operating setup for the sake of visitors.

Goldwater died May 29, 1998. Grandrud said she approached Goldwater's widow, Susan, about having the museum—a state agency—acquire the K7UGA station for display.

Grandrud could not say if the exhibit would be a permanent one but said Goldwater’s station would be maintained as part of the museum's collection. “We’re stewards of the public heritage,” she said. “It will be valued highly.”