I discovered your web site yesterday while searching for some information to share with friends.  Post Katrina, an old friend of mine moved from New Orleans area to Anchorage.  He works on the North Slope and I wanted to share some of my Alaskan experiences with him.

I was stationed at the Cape from Dec 78 to Dec 79.  There were 15 AF staff on site then with about 35 civilians.  Only the radar operations were handled by military staff.  All maintenance of the site and radar itself was performed by the civilian staff, many of which were former AF.  I helped to build the new satellite antenna site there in the summer of 79.  A crew came on site to manage and a few of us airmen were hired to do labor on our off time.  Mixing and pouring concrete into a 4’ thick pad with more rebar than I had ever seen before was my contribution.  I left before the antenna was operational.

The tram was not operational during my stay.  Many stories of its up and down history were told, but no one on site had ridden the tram while I was there.  I did have the pleasure of watching a stir crazy radar maintenance crew try to get down to the main site in a makeshift toboggan from White Top.  They had run out of beer and wanted to get down to main camp badly.  I was on duty and went to the back door at the ops room and watched them as my crew members talked to them on the phone.  Two of them got into the toboggan and started to slide down the mountain.  I did not take long before they were airborne and subsequently bailed out.  The toboggan made the trip to the bottom by itself.  Its two passengers climbed back inside the radome to change their pants.  I don’t think they were anticipated flying to the bottom.  We laughed at this classic redneck “watch this” episode for a long time.  The boys did without the beer.

We also, as did many others I am sure, went without a resupply plane of any type for 45 days due to inclement weather.  During one of the storms of that period, I was in the Ops room wearing winter parka etc as we were under attack by full hurricane force winds.  The rather large (36” or 48”) exhaust fan located in this room for pushing HOT air outside, was spun backwards more than once during my shift one long night.  The heavy equipment operators actually went outside in the D8 Cats to push snow up against the cold storage building and others to protect it from the wind.   That storm caused damage at a few of the sites.  Seems that either Sparavohn or Tatalina lost a roof on one of their buildings.  It was quite a ride.

I am pretty sure I am one of two people that skied at the Cape that year.  There was an old pair of cross country skis on site that were literally I think as old as I was at the time.  They consisted of two rather long boards with leather straps attached as bindings.  They were crude and while I can’t say for sure, may have been home made.

I used them to trudge around the site a time or two and once braved the slope behind the site in downhill mode.  The fact I am alive to retell this episode is somewhat amazing.  Trying to turn 8’ skis while bombing down a long steep slope is something one should consider before committing to the ride.

It was a real experience to be at the Cape.  I have many slides taken at the site which I can make available to you upon request.

Thanks for keeping the memory alive!

I was stationed at Cape Romanzof from August 1958 through July 1959. There were 95 military and white Alice civilians. I worked the power plant.
Had a great time, there was little or no skiing.
I am looking to locate Don Christensen who ran the Boiler Plant and Jack Butler who worked the Power plant.

After the Cape I was stationed at Castle A.F.B California. I was retrained to Ground Power Equipment. My four years of service was extended to four and a half. Discharged July of 1962, returned to Cincinnati, OH.

Attached are a few photos.

Thanks,

Ron Kruse

I have read with great interest the previous comments.  They have brought back many memories of my year at Cape Romanzof.  I was there from July of 1956 to July of 1957. 

Among other duties, I was the postal clerk for the unit.  This required that I make many trips down to the strip or to the bay to meet the mail plane.  In the summer they would land on wheels or on the bay on pontoons.  The mail was usually delivered by planes from the Northern Consolidated Airlines out of Bethal. Delivery was always dictated by the weather and the longest that we went without was a month.  The trip up and down was exciting in the winter as track vehicle were always needed.

Others have mentioned the tram that burned.  I helped to fight that fire and remember carrying fire hoses that were frozen stiff.

We had skis available to us and I did some cross country but never any downhill.  I was too dangerous because of the rocks.

My only regret is that I did not keep a list of the men and their hometowns so that I could have kept track of them.

Looking forward to more comments.

Stanley Amyx A/1C

I was pleasantly surprised to come across anything on Romanzof online. I was the resident Recreation Specialist there from September 1973 to September 1974 and most likely knew one of the other contributors, Dave Hannum, although his name doesn't ring any bells this many years later. During my tenure there wasn't much in the way of skiing going on although there was enough equipment available for maybe 5 or 6 guys to hit the slopes if they so desired. I did make a few runs with a Captain from the main camp down to the air strip that were fun but nothing to brag about since there were few places with any great degree of slope. Perhaps the best starting point would have been to get dropped off on the road to top camp a ways before it narrowed  to run the ridge. This would give you a fairly good slope to get started. As for any idea of making a run from the Radome directly down to the main camp, I think not. The physical makeup of that area was pretty much boulders the size of small cars, very steep and for the most part ice.

My skiing abilities were maybe bunny slope plus at best but since, at that time, they didn't allow people to go out alone I was the designated escort. So I cut down a pair of skis and moved the bindings forward to be able to be the "buddy" for anyone wanting to go out. One had to be pretty careful due to the rocks that littered the landscape, they'd be hidden just below the ice crystal powder, and patches of glare ice were quite common. As I recall the amount of snowfall was only something like 78 inches but the wind was constantly blowing anything loose from the Bering Sea right on to us making it seem like about 3-4 times as much - maybe it was.

I do have some pictures digitized of the site and would be happy to forward a few to whoever might be interested. Can't really say they are great shots though, it was hard at times to not wind up with lightning bolts across the image due to static electricity when winding the film.

Thanks,
Gary Shelly.