Gary Reeder
One of the towers I climbed was a bit over 1000 feet. It
Thursday, August 11, 2022, 14:01

took me 3 hours to get to the top and replace the light bulbs. I had to climb that tower a couple of times. The top lights were 2 bulbs, each about 18" in length. To get to them you have to unscrew one of the wing nuts on the sides of the outside casing, lean it back so both bulbs are showing and then replace them. And it never failed that when I leaned the casing backwards there would be a wasp nest in there.
I guess I should mention in radio I had the morning show for 17 years and I got fired several times for pulling silly ass publicity stunts on the air, so I took an 8 week course in Dallas to get my 1st class license which meant I was the same as a chief engineer. I didn't know diddly but I was legal to sign off on the chief engineer's log every day. Plus being chief engineer/DJ I was obliged to climb the tower every time it got hit by lightning, which was around 2 to 3 times every summer. That was in my contract. I climbed 3 towers, Two of them were under 500 feet and the big one at almost 1000 feet.
Every radio station had to have a 1st Class man on call or on the payroll so after that I was a bit more valuable to them than before as chief engineer and DJ on the morning show. After that (1968) I was never fired again. I still pulled the same silly ass stunts on the air but I didn't get fired. In 1973 I was made program director so I was doing the firing. I stayed in radio until 1985 when I retired after 22 years and got into building custom guns full time,