The original University radio club was founded in November 1964 - the February 1966 edition of "Practical Wireless" magazine refers to the "new Society" in a large feature article. Like the modern club, they also supported member's licenses - a December sitting of the R.A.E. (Radio Amateur Examination) saw 6 licensees pass (coincidentally the same number the modern revival had in 2026!). The article in PW mentions the hope to receive the callsign G3UOS - this was allocated to the club, but we do not have access to it currently.
The club eventually was given a permentant home in one of the buildings on Mappin St., where radios were housed and antennas systems were constructed. There was also the famous GB3US 70cm repeater in the Arts Tower. Tony Whitaker was instrumental in developing the new "-US" repeater architecture, made using the new (at the time!) 74 series ICs. This would become the standard for a huge number of amateur repeaters in the UK for many years.
The original club folded when the building was demolished as the club had nowhere to go - this was around 1984. The building was about where the entrance to the Portobello centre is now found.
From 1984, when the club folded, the amateur radio society is rarely documented and information is fairly murky. We do know that GB3US remained active for some time, until it was moved to the Hadfield building. When this was refurbished, it had to come down as the housing for it was incredibly battered. It briefly moved to the Fredrick Mappin Building, but the coverage here was poor. GB3US was attempted to be moved back to the Arts Tower, but Ofcom refused and the University would likely not have let this happen anyway as the club was not active. This led to the end of the GB3US repeater. Note that since then it has been reallocated for various repeaters, a few of which in Sheffield - but we have no affiliation with the new keepers.
In 2025, the club was properly revived to form the new University of Sheffield Amateur Radio Club. The club now has a solid student membership, licensing students and teaching them all about radio. We are hoping for a permenant QTH soon to enable us to be more active on the air.
If you have anything to contribute to the history of this club, please just email uosarc@sheffield.ac.uk - we'd love to hear from you.