Radio FUMA

I was not there at the beginning nor end, but certainly was involved in the midle.

If memory serves me right, the station used to be upstairs in the old lower school gym (however I could be wrong).

When I reached the Upper School, I and a number of other cadets ran the station. We started as a carrier current station and later added an antenna. The station was located in the chapel tower. The transmitter we ended up with was out of an old ARRL Amateur Radio Handbook and at one point used toilet paper rolls for the coil holder. It seems regular phenolic ones didn't work. The station was capable of putting out well over 5 watts :-)

During our reign, we took electronics from an old ship to shore transmitter/receiver down in maintenance, much to Capt Faix's chagrin, as he was either the owner or had 1st dibs. Some of the wire-wound resisters had massive amounts of (probably tungsten) very thin wire. That wire was used for antennas and specifically my TV antenna when in D and E company. I didn't want anyone to know I had an external antenna.

I found that the Lutheran Layman League had radio shows called "Day By Day With Jesus" and that if we asked very nicely, we could get the mag tapes, play the shows and then keep the tapes instead of returning them. These then became a mainstay of our operations.

Once, we had a member who loaned us a tape recorder with sound-on-sound and sound-with-sound, which allowed us to create some really nice reverb effects. Prior to the tapes, the Day By Day shows came on record. Our signoff was "Good Vibrations" by the Beach Boys. Chuck was at the controls when we started to sign off one day. While he played with the equipment, I was at the console. We were in a silly mood at the time. The Day By Day show was started, but Chuck had the reverb on full. As the record played and I heard the booming voice with heavy echo, I hollered "NOT IN REVERB" and laughed and hit the floow. The record skipped to the end, all the while, Chuck and I laughing and I believe the mike wa son at the time.

Listeners that day would have heard this:

{heavy echo} "THIS IS DAY BY DAY WIH JESUS", {I hollered} "not in REVERB!", {the record skips with a loud scratch} "THIS HAS BEEN DAY BY DAY WITH JESUS". Chuck says he still has a copy of that tape somewhere.

The call letters WPET were taken from a real radio station elsewhere on the east coast. We had some professionally created ID's rom somewhere. We were an illegal station as far as the FCC was concerned.

There is a message elsewhere in the forums about how we almost lost the chapel to a fire.

We were proud to have run a popular station. However, Captain Hoffman the Quartermaster always talked poorly about the station. I soon found out why. Years earlier, a cadet was on the air and dedicated a song to Capt Hoffman; a very inappropriate reference to the crippled man. The song was "Walk Like A Man". The cadet was busted and the station may have been shut down for a while. A short while before he died, I had a chance to sit and talk with "Fred Hoffman" about his life. We both knew his health was bad and that he was probably never leaving the academy again and was under constant care. The topic of this song dedication came up and even though it was decades later, you could tell that it had hurt him deeply. I'm glad that our group had nothing to do with that episode.

I don't have access to my yearbook or photos of the station, however, some of the DJ's and radio station memebers were: Mark Shultise (me), Chuck Lewis, Dale Cross, Charlie Wilson, Paul Anderson?, many others and our fearless leader, Capt. Feathers.

Capt. Feathers tells the story later that sometime after 1969, cadets decided to boost power and twist the dials, and people out in town started complaining to the FCC about station operations. Capt. feathers received an in-person visit from federal authorities and I'll let him tell the rest of the story. It was not pretty :-)

So for those who listened during the 60's to WPET Fork Union, the "Tigers On The Loose!"