2555 HST Cab Jeep rocker switches....

[oldpilgrim]

Jerry, I remember flipping the switches but no way do I gave your memory for the detail. You dragged it out of the deepest hollows of my brain. I remember doing exactly that, night after night. I don't miss the smell of the oil or the paper tape falling all over the floor from the TT machine because the take up reel was full . Worse was the TT machine running out of tape but still working away as if it still had paper, losing stuff that shouldn't have been lost.

Lots of lost memories just surfaced. Thanks.

 

[JerryK]

The doctor here at the hospital says that someday I will forget, the nightmares will subside, and I will be able to rejoin society........

 

[dickfoster]

I used to love the smell of the oil on the paper tape, used to load programs onto some early micro.

Or pornography printed on an ASR 33 or LA 36 Decwriter.

I used to have to read a lot of five level tape by eye. Ever tried doing octal math in your head? It takes a little practice to get used to. My head was a real mess and I guess it still is to some extent.

 

[JerryK]

That's one of the first things you had to do in a large comm center. You worked big banks of tape punches and could hardly keep up putting rolls of tape in them, changed the rolls on the fly [ had to have them resend the message you messed up doing it], did not ever put ink ribbons in them. You picked up reading the message number, to/from I.D.'s, log'n same, writing the info on the first of the tape, finding the end of the message/rip'n it off, winding up the message, taking it over to the send area/sliding it onto the proper send rod for the sending operator, then wade back into the receiving station to try to catch up. Reading the holes was the least of your problem, and you picked that up REAL QUICK... They always put the new guys on the busy areas.... while all the old operators gave them **** until they caught on. Four crews, worked day shift, then three days off, second shift, then three days off, then nights, two days off, then back to days.. etc... [ if I remember right ]. All in a little fenced off area right behind the I.G. Farben building by a park in Frankfurt. You could tell real quick if a guy was any good.... They drug the rejects out to the local mental hospital....

 

[oldpilgrim]

Are you referring to the trucks and trailers at the back of the Farben Blg or Dachsbau which was a bit further away? I pitied the guys out in the trailers. I was inside at the NSA op center, large, spacious, cool and could look out the window at the poor guys working in the trucks and trailers that were out there. I spent a couple of winter months at Dachsbau, then spent the remaining 3 years inside the Farben Bldg. I quartered at the White House (Kennedy Kaserne) for a month or so, then at Gutleut Kaserne for a few months and then went off post when my wife came over.

I started at NSA as a keypunch operator, but was so bad at it, they promoted me to the paper tape punch machine loader/unloader. Next step up was the PDP8 operator, then the 360/40 computer operator which I was actually trained for.

The 3,3,3 rotating shift was a beetch. You never got used to it and i was always in a daze.

You could tell real quick if a guy was any good.... They drug the rejects out to the local mental hospital....

I had to take one guy to the med center as he kept passing out on shift...couldn't stand the pressure. When he got to see the Doc, he had no idea who I was even though we'd been working together for 4 months. Can't remember what happened to him.

 

[JerryK]

Nope. We had a building beside the park [ actually inside the park ] that was behind the big building. Old guys used to sit outside playing chess on the permanent park stone tables. Single story white building [ NO windows ], high double fence with barbed wire, dog's 24/7. Back then it housed the primary relay center for Europe, and a magnetic tape outfit that sent stuff to the USA. I think we were second highest in traffic in the world for the Agency. Had old timey microphones on the stations and the place sounded like a zoo when we were real busy. Which was just about always depending on what was cranking in that part of the world. I was up in the NSA offices once when I first got there to activate my clearance for the facility, seems to me they were on the end of the second or third floor. Been a LONG TIME. They have since returned the I.G Farben to local control. Google Earth shows everything all gone. We lived in a converted two story school house about two blocks away.

 

[JerryK]

OK, this is from a site online...

I was a 31J TTY Repariman assigned to USASA Comm Unit Europe from November of 1970 to November 1972. The unit was housed at Kennedy Kaserne (The White House) (It is on the corner of Escherheimer Landstrasse and Bremer Strasse. It is only about a quarter mile from the IG Farben building. I was there in 1977 and it was just an abandoned building.) Our Communications Center was located on the edge of Gruenerberg Park beyond the IG Farben building from the Kaserne. It was referred to as Dachsbau. It was a single story structure surrounded by a double chain link fence topped with razor wire. Next door was an area where the germans would walk their dogs.

So, I guess I lived at the ' White House ', and worked at Dachsbau.... I kind of remember the white house thing, but I don't remember it being referred to as Dachsbau. I was only there for 9 months. Made PFC right after I got there, then SP4.. but that is as far as I could have probably ever got with all the lifers hiding over there from the war. It was pretty expensive, with the good beer/food/nightlife/going to Amsterdam on the weekend/racing our VW's up thru the Tanus Mtns... Some arse hole signed my name on a 1049 and I made SGT about six months later on the other side of the world. Long, long, time ago.......

 

[dickfoster]

OK, this is from a site online...

I was a 31J TTY Repariman assigned to USASA Comm Unit Europe from November of 1970 to November 1972. The unit was housed at Kennedy Kaserne (The White House) (It is on the corner of Escherheimer Landstrasse and Bremer Strasse. It is only about a quarter mile from the IG Farben building. I was there in 1977 and it was just an abandoned building.) Our Communications Center was located on the edge of Gruenerberg Park beyond the IG Farben building from the Kaserne. It was referred to as Dachsbau. It was a single story structure surrounded by a double chain link fence topped with razor wire. Next door was an area where the germans would walk their dogs.

So, I guess I lived at the ' White House ', and worked at Dachsbau.... I kind of remember the white house thing, but I don't remember it being referred to as Dachsbau. I was only there for 9 months. Made PFC right after I got there, then SP4.. but that is as far as I could have probably ever got with all the lifers hiding over there from the war. It was pretty expensive, with the good beer/food/nightlife/going to Amsterdam on the weekend/racing our VW's up thru the Tanus Mtns... Some arse hole signed my name on a 1049 and I made SGT about six months later on the other side of the world. Long, long, time ago.......

You guys and your buildings. I was out in the boondocks, in a tent much of the time and living out of a suitcase even when I was home for the brief periods that I was able to be home. Gone for three or four months at a time, home for a couple of weeks then back out for another three or four month stretch in another area of the globe with several jobs in different places during those months. Start out in the Indian Ocean and end up in Europe or start out in Southeast Asia and end up in the South Pacific. I'd start to go nuts if I was in any one place for longer than six weeks at a stretch.

 

[JerryK]

You guys and your buildings. I was out in the boondocks, in a tent much of the time and living out of a suitcase even when I was home for the brief periods that I was able to be home. Gone for three or four months at a time, home for a couple of weeks then back out for another three or four month stretch in another area of the globe with several jobs in different places during those months. Start out in the Indian Ocean and end up in Europe or start out in Southeast Asia and end up in the South Pacific. I'd start to go nuts if I was in any one place for longer than six weeks at a stretch.

We was wondering what caused your current condition..... [[[ ]]]

 

[oldpilgrim]

The White House had 3 or 4 floors with an elevator near the front door. I had to do gate guard duty from the concrete gate house there. Was staff duty officer there many times. CO and 1st Sgt had their offices there on first floor. Was in those offices way too many times. . I was with HQ and Service Company, but Com Unit also had staff there.

Dachsbau was to the rear and left of the IGF bldg at the end of a dead end road, with a razor wire fence around it. One level building. Some parking area to the left, work area to the left, toilets to the right. When I was there, the toilet area was not heated !

I'm told it was called that because it was originally a dog kennel before the US took it over.

I've looked over the whole area using google earth and barely recognize the place. It look like a housing complex was build right in the middle of the old Gutleut Kaserne walls. The main PX complex a mile or so down the road is apparently gone. The old mess hall to the back and rear of the IGF is gone.

It would be interesting to go back, but I'm getting too old for a trip like that now.