<\/p>\n
\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Former WOAS-FM General Manager Mike \u2018Zenith\u2019 Bennett was much too young when he passed away a few years back.\u00a0 Mike was my radio mentor and he made it a point to stay in touch years after he had moved from Ontonagon to Bessemer and eventually to Marquette.\u00a0 When I was first getting involved in WOAS, we spent many hours talking about life, music, and radio.<\/span><\/p>\n Mike had big dreams for extending the broadcast reach of our little 10 watt FM station.\u00a0 Had he been able to stay in Ontonagon longer, he very well may have been able to find the grants needed to upgrade our signal path.\u00a0 Zenith envisioned boosting our signal to 100 watts and sending it to the tower located at the top of the Porkies Ski Hill, thus expanding our broadcast footprint much farther than our normal 15 to 20 miles.\u00a0 Mike was forced to leave his beloved station behind to follow other job opportunities, but that doesn\u2019t mean I don\u2019t still hold mental conversations with him when plotting our next project at WOAS-FM.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0It wasn\u2019t all that long ago that the phrase \u201cWhat Would Jesus Do?\u201d was popular.\u00a0 The shortened version appeared everywhere from posters to wristbands, condensing the message to \u2018WWJD?\u2019.\u00a0 My radio version of this is \u2018WWZS?\u2019.\u00a0 It has been over twenty years since Mike left town so there have been many changes at WOAS-FM.\u00a0 When I look at something at WOAS-FM that is now different than before Mike left, I often ask myself, \u201cWhat Would Zenith Say?\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0When he was still stopping by or making contact via e-mail, Mike always asked, \u201cWhat\u2019s new?\u201d\u00a0 When I filled him in on the latest upgrade project or programming change, he was always positive and encouraging.\u00a0 During my first two years as GM, we were able to gather enough grants and donations to do a full remodelling of the station facilities and equipment.\u00a0 It was the first large scale upgrade since Mike\u2019s Community School program had taken over the station\u2019s operations in the 1980s.\u00a0 When he heard the story of how we were able to get both studios recarpeted, he laughed and said, \u201cYou must have planned it that way.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0We just happened to be in the process of removing all of the desks, shelves, and equipment bays prior to replacing all of our electronic gear when the school contracted to have the carpeting in the library replaced.\u00a0 The principal was fine with the new carpeting being extended into our studios which occupy two former study rooms adjacent to the library.\u00a0 \u201cAs long as they have enough spare carpeting to do it,\u201d was all he said.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t bother to mention to him that I had already talked to the contractor.\u00a0 He had assured me that it was standard procedure to order a certain amount of extra carpeting and he anticipated our two little rooms could be done with what they already had on hand.\u00a0 Both the principal and contractor reminded me that I would have to clear the stuff out of the rooms, but by the time we got to discussing it, the rooms were already empty.\u00a0 In this case, I was able to get an answer to WWZS? right from the horse\u2019s mouth.\u00a0 Mike said, \u201cAtta boy, that is exactly how I would have done it.\u00a0 Never buy something that is free or can be bartered for.\u201d\u00a0 Zenith would have been one of those \u2018tinkers\u2019 in the old days as he was a master of bartering deals to get what was needed for WOAS and his Community Schools program.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Mike wanted to increase our signal to 100 watts but the cost of the equipment to do so was beyond our meager budget.\u00a0 Any time Mike would learn about an upcoming grant, he would set about writing a proposal that might allow the upgrade.\u00a0 Up to the point he moved to Bessemer, no grant money was forthcoming (but he kept looking, even after he left Ontonagon).\u00a0 Raising the signal from 10 to 100 watts wasn\u2019t the show stopper here, it was the height of our tower.\u00a0 FM signals travel in a straight line and one must have a clear path between their receiver and the tower to pick up the signal.\u00a0 With the hilly topography surrounding Ontonagon, merely boosting the signal wouldn\u2019t yield the results that Mike was hoping for.\u00a0 The WOAS-FM tower is located next to the school gym and tops off at 138 feet in elevation.\u00a0 Ontonagon is the lowest part of the county with ranges of hills in excess of 1500 feet twelve miles in three directions.\u00a0 To truly extend the WOAS-FM signal, the increased wattage would need to be broadcast from a higher tower or at least a tower in a higher location.\u00a0 The cost and logistics of bouncing our signal off the tower that already existed at the top of the Porkies Ski Hill (and is still there) were two insurmountable problems that kept frustrating Mike.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Zenith had already left Ontonagon when the school was first wired for the internet.\u00a0 An interested group of volunteers (including yours truly) helped the crew from the Intermediate School District string the cables, thus expediting our jump into the digital world.\u00a0 As soon as we had the basic knowledge and tools to begin using the internet as a teaching tool, we began to investigate the possibility of expanding WOAS\u2019s reach via the internet.\u00a0 Mike kept sending me ideas of how we might be able to fund the signal boost, but as previously mentioned, none of these avenues panned out.\u00a0 When the idea of broadcasting the WOAS-FM signal on the internet was mentioned, it was another case of getting a direct WWZS? answer:\u00a0 \u201cIf you can do that, it would be really cool!\u201d\u00a0 The technology employed by the ISD to get all the schools online was changing so rapidly that we spent a lot of time retooling our internet broadcast idea as things evolved.\u00a0 We would find a way to adapt our signal chain to the system and as soon as we worked out most of the bugs, the equipment would be improved and we would have another hoop to jump through.<\/span><\/p>\n \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0One area that the ISD tweaked a couple of times was the support network.\u00a0 The\u00a0 larger the system grew, the more staff they needed to work on the facilities.\u00a0 As the technological side expanded, a help network evolved so there is now a dedicated crew of techies available.\u00a0 The tech support team assists users when problems come up and upgrades are needed.\u00a0 When the network was smaller, some of us were trained to do much of the trouble shooting on our own.\u00a0 There were times when I would get a call to go and \u2018recycle the power\u2019 on the equipment bay in my old classroom.\u00a0 This meant a trip down the hall to perform the reset.\u00a0 I would wait a minute to power things back up, then trot back to my room and report what the indicator lights were doing.\u00a0 If the system reset worked, it saved someone a trip from the ISD-REMC 1 office in Hancock.\u00a0 Most small computer problems were handled by those of us who had been given the minimal \u2018how to fix minor problems\u2019 training.\u00a0 As the system became more and more complex, it made more sense for the ISD to consolidate the problem solving duties to a centralized staff who would be fully attuned to the intricacies of the network.\u00a0 I used to feel fairly competent trouble shooting computer problems, but those skills have eroded since we now have someone else taking care of computer and network issues.<\/span><\/p>\n