Saw the photo of Mike Corrado, in the Burlington Free Press, shown above and it reminded me of back in the early years when I moved here on the Fletcher Road after I built my house. Mike was working for George S. Wood in St. Albans at the time and was their Television Technician. My TV reception here was poor and Mike installed a television antenna up on my roof that stood 40 feet above the peak. In order to hold it in place, he used 600 feet of guide wire and what was more remarkable, he did it all by himself, putting up each 10 foot section and securing it to the roof. Needless to say, I did get good TV reception and whenever people asked directions to my house, it was always easy to describe by saying it was the house with the big high antenna on it, 2 miles up the road from Fairfax Village.
I believe it was June 11, 1973 when the Tornado hit Fairfax and a day or two afterwards, who should pull into my yard by Mike Corrado. He told me he just wanted to check and see if the antenna withstood the tornado and Lo & Behold it did. Whenever I have seen Mike since the day he installed that antenna, we always talk about it. Since that time I had to have someone go up and reinstall a wire to the antenna. Shirley Minor and Laurent Lavallee did it the first time, however they did not use ladders like Mike Corrado did, they built a staging to get up there. The wire only lasted a few years when the rotor gave out and I was unable to turn it, so ended hiring someone with a big boom to swing up there and take the whole thing down. Not sure just what year that was, but never had to worry about it being blown down.
Someday when I run across some photos of it being torn down will put them up, but know that most of the old timers in the area will remember my house with the antennas. I say antennas, because starting in the mid 1970s, I got into CB Radios and put a few more up on my house, although those were not up that high.
