CHIME COMBO SWINGS AT SUNDAY-AT-TEN

It all started one day three years ago when I was a freshman at the University of Puget Sound. I was calmly walking out of the library when the bells chimed the hour. It took not more than an instant before my complete attention was firmly riveted upon this rather mundane phenomenon. I noticed a singularly peculiar quality in the ton of the chimes; they were not bells at all but were electronically produced! Subsequent investigations revealed four bullhorn speakers affixed to the roof of the library.

“Steve,” I said to myself, for truly that was my name, “that system is begging to be sabotaged.” It was not more than a week later I met one B. Patrick O’Connor at my weekly Naval Reserve meeting. We discovered that we both went to UPS and had both made the same observation regarding the belltower. We made a vow then and there to someday introduce our own sounds into the tower. We had several plus marks on our side before we started; he was training to be an electronics technician, I a sonarman, also electronically oriented. Past was an ardent stereo bug. With this basis to work on he commenced to investigate the system.

Our first discovery was that the speakers were the only segment of the system located at the library. Where was the rest of the system? We knew that there were amplifiers and reproduction facilities somewhere along with a keyboard for the chapel preludes on Thursdays. At this point our membership in the band began to pay off. Glorious was the day we went to hear a recital in the auditorium of the Music Building. Upon finding no seats on the main floor we sent to the second floor to get into the balcony. As we passed by room 201 we happened to glance in the window and behold, there it was! The carillon console, the “player piano” machine and monitor speaker.

The next problem that faced us was that of entry into the locked room 201. We were stymied. It was not possible to proceed with the operation until the following year.

During our sophomore year the next piece fell into our belltower puzzle. One night while doing a recording job for Dr. Rogers, the master key fell into Pat’s sweating little hands. By the time Pat got to me he could barely gasp out, “I got it, I … I … got it.”

“You got what?”

“Th …. The key!”

It took about five minutes to have a duplicate made. We floated around campus for a week at least before we calmed down enough to try our little erasure and did it work!? How many people have access to the linen closets in the lavatories of the Music Building? (Oh, Dr. Rogers, did you know that the key to room 32 also opens your office?)

We now had entry into 201, but much to our dismay there were neither amplifiers not automatic hour ringing devices. We were left with two ends of a system with no middle. All we needed was a way to make ends meet.

It was not until this year and an addition of a third member to our project, Rocky Smith, that we found the answer. Rock has had extensive experience in radio and communications and with his encouragement we started again where we had left off. We then realized that the cable from the carillon system went up through the ceiling instead of down through the floor. We decided to see what was above. Imagine our surprise when we opened what we had previously thought to be a utility room and found our “missing link”. We stood there pointing and stammering, “That’s it! That’s it!! We own the bells!”

On top of one of the amplifier cabinets were several large mailing envelopes containing the complete circuit diagrams for the bell system. These were removed, memorized, and replaced. Armed with the knowledge of the circuitry of the system, we designed a method of connecting a tape recorder to the booster amplifier which feeds two 300 watt hi-fi power amplifiers which in turn drive the four speakers at the library. No altering of the normal wiring or normal functions of the system were necessary. I’m sorry, Prof. Lindley, we did not use a phonograph and records; that’s rather crude. We had designed a highly refined and reliable method for our sound reproduction which did not require our presence during our magnificent achievement in sound.

Dr. Rogers helped us again by providing ready accessibility to the music department’s Sony four-track stereo tape recorder. Of course, he didn’t know it! We programmed a tape using sound effects and “canned” voices to last seven minutes. This was prefaced with one hour of blank tape reversed so that the plastic back of the tape was against the pick-up head, this insuring complete silence while we made good our alibis.

The system was assembled the afternoon of the sabotage, and “all systems were go” at three o’clock in the afternoon. The only operation that now had to be performed was to plug in the recorder and turn on the amplifier, an operation requiring all of 15 seconds. Another stroke of luck came our way the day of the operation. The orchestra, rehearsing for an upcoming concert, provided Pat and me not only with an alibi, but put us in the building as well. At 8:45 the orchestra adjourned for a fifteen-minute break. At 8:57, while I guzzled coffee and ate a pound of cookies in my nervousness, Pat plugged in the recorder and began the countdown. Rock was alerted and the longest hour in college careers began. At precisely 9:57 a voice issued forth from the library and the rest is history.

In spite of our clever planning and careful execution, we overlooked one important fact: Who else is capable of doing such a thing? (No conceit intended.) In less than fifteen minutes the blame was properly placed by Dr. Thompson, without whose brilliant deduction we would have slipped into obscurity to gloat over our achievement in sound.

                           Now for the post-script.

Steve left out one member of our group. He played a smaller, but important part in the whole operation. C. Michael Fisher was the fourth member of our party. He would often hang out in the hallway, or wherever needed, to assure we were not ever observed in any of our activities. He would alert us if anyone was coming, or distract and divert them to let us do what we needed to do.

Another fact was it would have been foolish indeed to attempt this whole thing without first testing the system. UPS is on the main flight-path of McCord Air Base in Tacoma. On overcast days, we played sound effects of airplanes to test our system, set sound levels and the like. On at least four occasions we did this to assure we had everything correct on the “big day.” It was the second or third test that the volume was too high, and airplane sounds literally rattled the windows of the buildings near the library. To our astonishment, no one really noticed or cared, since planes were so commonly heard.

The night of the event an estimated 700 students gathered in the quad to listen to our little concert. This was about one-half of the resident student population at the time.

Dr. Thompson (University President at the time) was much more upset than what would have been considered normal for a prank that really had no victim. Not only were all of our parents notified of our little prank, but we were all threatened with being expelled from the University. Had it not been for several other faculty members defending our achievement in sound as fairly harmless, it could have been the end of a few college careers. It was not until some weeks later we learned why Dr. Thompson had been so upset.

It seems the carillon system had been donated about ten years earlier by a fairly wealthy couple. It was quite expensive in its day, costing about $50,000 (this was the figure given to us when we were being "disciplined" after the event) in the mid 1950’s. As luck would have it (how were we to know?) that on the evening the chimes took on a whole new personality, this same couple was on campus, at Dr. Thompson’s residence, negotiating another donation to the University to the tune of $100,000 to build a new chapel. They apparently were not amused, and nearly withdrew their donation. Ultimately they were assured the hooligans involved would be severely disciplined and they went ahead with their donation for the chapel. We noticed that for several days following the great event the chimes were silent. It was about mid-week the following week when I was called in to meet with Dr. Thompson. Two or three other faculty members were present, and it became clear why the chimes had not been heard since Sunday. Remember the length of the sounds? Seven minutes. A time that was chosen very carefully. We had calculated that if we wanted it to play in its entirety it needed to be less than ten minutes, the time we figured someone could gain access to the system and shut it down. Our estimate proved very accurate. It was apparently somewhere between nine and twelve minutes that keys were located, the room was entered, and the system shut off. Someone then made the decision to leave it off as a bluff so that they could claim it had been damaged, and would take great expense to repair it. And Dr. Thompson played the bluff card. “Technicians have examined the system and it will cost hundreds of dollars to fix it” I was told.
I called the bluff, since we knew we had not damaged the system. At the time I was a licensed electronics technician, holding a valid FCC second class license. I gave Dr. Thompson a detailed written report with schematics of how we had connected to the system and assured him that nothing was done that the system had not been designed to handle. Also, at this time, we explained we had been testing the system for well over a month, and obviously no damage was done. At this point, one of the other faculty members present could see the futility of carrying the bluff any farther, suggested we be put on some kind of probation and the whole issue be forgotten. That afternoon the chimes were once again heard over the campus.

Those of us involved managed to go on and graduate in our respective years, though at my commencement three years later Dr. Thompson did make some comment, in humor by then, that it was nice that I was no longer going to be on campus any longer. Most of my class and most of the faculty knew what he was talking about.

In 1972, some six years after the whole incident, and three years after I graduated from UPS, Mike Fisher and I were both working at KBMY in Billings, Montana. We would often, after spending a long day at work, stop at the local Sambos restaurant for desert on our way home. It was one of these evenings, we commented to our waiter when we were leaving we’d see him next week. He said no, he was moving back home to Bellingham, Washington in a few days and would no longer be working there. Mike made a comment that we had spent some time in his home area since we had both attended UPS. His next question caught us both off guard. “Do guys remember when the belltower went nuts?” Imagine his shock when Mike and I looked at each other, and in unison said, “Remember it!? We DID it!!”

Over 20 years after we played our prank I was still hearing from people who had either heard it or heard of it. So, not only was it a great practical joke, it lived long in memory for years and years afterward.



Footnote: I posted this mid-July, 2006. Just tonight (July 23, 2006) I discovered there was an encore performance.


http://www2.ups.edu/arches/2006Spring/featureChimes.html


I have e-mailed the ARCHES and hope to someday talk to Jeff Strong. We seem to have something in common. Also, I just realized that this year marks 40 years from the date we did the original tolling of the bells with voices, cuckoos, train whistles and many other bizzare sounds.

 The original audio from that Sunday is here.

(Update -- As of January 2009 I have not been able to contact Jeff Strong.  If anyone knows Jeff, or can contact him, I would like to visit with him.)