No radio amateur in his or her right mind would be caught dead saying “Breaker Breaker” on the airwaves these days.
But we do have occasion to say “break,” for example when others are passing “traffic” or information, and we have a bona fide need to interrupt.
Ever wonder where the term came from?
As is often the case with ham radio jargon, the term “break” harkens back to the pre-radio telegraph operator days. Telegraphs transmitted their signals by wire, so the various telegraph stations in an area were all inter-connected by this wire. When one telegraph operator was sending, everyone else on the line was receiving, by definition.
If one of the receiving telegraphers had emergency or priority traffic to communicate, he needed a way to “break in” on the guy who is currently sending.
The telegrapher with the emergency traffic would disconnect one of the wires used to transmit and receive information (thus “breaking” the circuit). This would instantly quiet the whole area, and get the attention of every telegrapher on that line, including the guy who had been merrily tapping out his messages. The wire could then be re-attached and the emergency traffic passed.
Removing a wire like this is called a “break” and the person doing it is called a “breaker.”
These terms stuck and the notion is still in use today. “Break” is a means for hams to break in with priority or emergency traffic. “Breaker-Breaker” or “Breaker-Break” was a term widely used on Citizen’s Band or “CB” radio, most notably in it’s hey-day back in the 1970s.
Think of the movie “Smokey and the Bandit” or the hit song “Convoy” by C. W. McCall…