TV by Candlelight?

With the beginning of the winter Olympics, I can’t help but marvel at the technology involved in getting the television picture from so many sporting sites and venues all the way from China to our living rooms. It boggles the mind when you think about it (as I’m sure you have). An image, captured first by a camera and transformed into a complex conglomeration of frequencies, or ones and zeros if digital as everything is these days, and somehow, almost magically, transmitted halfway around the world, all in the blink of an eye. (Well, possibly two blinks as China is quite far away.)

As it happens, yours truly was involved in such magic back in the day, but on a much simpler scale. Few people knew that Southwestern Bell, along with AT&T, was a vital link in getting an event from A to B. I’ll use the Oklahoma State Cowboys, Lewis Field in Stillwater, Oklahoma as an example.

OU vs. OSU football. Bedlam. A must see for any red-blooded Okie football fan. So how do we get that game of the year from the field to your TV set in living color? It wasn’t as easy then as now when the TV truck parks next to the field and simply shoots the signal to a satellite in space. The word “simply” being a massive understatement.  Back in olden times, somebody had to take that signal and get it to what, in ATT terms, was known as the “backbone”, a network of repeaters and amplifiers that spanned the country via microwave frequencies. And before you ask, no, not the same kind of microwaves used to heat your morning biscuit.

Back in Stillwater, our first job was to secure press passes, a little card you hung around your neck to allow entry to all parts of the stadium. I remember one occasion where the Athletic Director decided that we, lowly peon scum telephone men that we were, didn’t need press passes. I politely pointed out how he would have to explain to a few million people why there was no Bedlam broadcast because Southwestern Bell was not allowed access to the stadium. He changed his mind.

Next, we set up the Ma Bell portable microwave system. It was usually a three-day process. Haul and set up, test and alignment, game day, and tear down. In this example, the transmitter was at the top of the press box at Lewis Field. The receiver was at the AT&T tower near the little town of Glencoe, OK, a distance of about 15 miles if memory serves. Glencoe then connected to the “backbone”.

The transmitter and dish, a parabola about four feet in diameter, connected to the control equipment in our specially-designed-by-us truck. That truck would be parked near the TV production vehicle from which we got the signal to be fed back to the local station and beyond. The TV truck might be from local stations such as KTUL or KOTV or sometimes if it was a national feed, a network truck such as NBC or CBS.

While you might think, what a job! Getting to watch a game at the stadium for free? In fact, there was little time to relax. We seldom saw any live action. Our eyes were glued to the monitors and the oscilloscopes that showed the electronic components of the signal, watching for any irregularities, signs of a problem. We had voice communication up and down the “backbone”.

An exchange might go like this: “New York to St. Louis. We got excessive tilt on the second equalizing pulse. You see it?”

 “We do. Hello, Tulsa. You see that?”

 “Yes, hello Stillwater. You got a problem!”

Stillwater was ME. To have a problem on a national feed with the entire country watching and millions of advertising dollars on the line, you better know what the hell you’re doing or be prepared to look for another job.

On this day, our boss volunteered to stand guard up at the dish to make sure no one got in the signal path and disrupt the feed. I suspect he volunteered mostly to have a great view of the game. The press box was packed, barely a place to stand. Reporters and staff everywhere. We had a warning rope adorned with red flags, marking the critical area around our transmitter, but this didn’t stop a sportswriter from somewhere. He stepped over the rope. Our boss told him to get back, to get out of there. The writer said, “Oh relax, I’m not going to get in front of your dish.” You didn’t talk to our boss like that.

“Young man, you WILL cross back over that rope immediately or I will personally throw your ass off the top of this stadium.” He crossed. Don’t mess with Ma Bell during a telecast.

I take a little pride in saying that in all the 20 some years of doing TV feeds (pre-satellite) we never lost a shot. Came close once when a receiver went up in smoke only moments after signoff, but that was it. Yes, it was quite a job. I loved it.

A typical TV signal presentation on an oscilloscope similar to the ones we used.