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[TowerTalk] Field Day

To: towertalk@contesting.com
Subject: [TowerTalk] Field Day
From: WarrenWolff@aol.com
Date: Mon, 2 Jul 2007 23:45:27 EDT
List-post: <mailto:towertalk@contesting.com>
Greetings,
 
I could not resist commenting on using  football stadiums for Field Day.
 
Our gang at New Mexico A&M, now New  Mexico State University, operated 
W5GEM/W5GB for Field Day out of the Aggie  Stadium.
 
We had very little support from the  university; so we made do with whatever 
we could find.  I believe we  borrowed a generator from the CAP, and paid 25 
cents per gallon for gasoline (it  was either 1956 or 1957).
 
We shot a line over the power lines  between the light poles and attached 
some really
tough field wire which we dragged  across the grass to the other side.
 
First problem:  No one had the  guts to climb the pole on the opposite side.  
We just
left it hanging/drooping across the  field.  Tried a quick CQ (CW) and it 
worked fine as
it was.  Main operators were W5SUC  (Jim) and Warren (W5KKW).  This long wire
worked any frequency with that pi  network.
 
About midnight before time to start  competing, Buddy showed up, a little bit 
tipsy.  He had what it took and  raised the wire to 75 feet and tied it off.
 
With that little DX-35 and one hour  down time (RF choke opened), we still 
came in about
29th place.
 
We are not sure who took the long wire  back down.  I think we just left it.  
No one would go up to disconnect  it.  That field wire was way to tough to 
yank on to break it; I think some  strands were steel.
 
Press boxes with no windows were fine  in NM, but those nights get quite cool.
 
Those were the good ole days.   Folks around here, so I am told, choose to 
skip FD because of the heat!   Maybe  I can activate a couple of CW folks next 
year??
 
Regards,  Warren;  W7WY



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