I wonder how long it will take to resume normal broadcasting conditions, with new programmes. Maybe by the early 90s?
 
I wonder how long it will take to resume normal broadcasting conditions, with new programmes. Maybe by the early 90s?

@Archangel, that’s a good question.

As far as nationwide broadcasting? With an active effort by the new federal government in Washington state in cooperation with active state governments, maybe 2015. That would depend on a hundred things, ranging from fallout affecting areas where you need to put dedicated communications lines, to being able to produce components for television and radio sets. In fact, I’m not certain the 50 states have been reunified by 2017 in the P&S universe.

Anyone else want to weigh in? @Chipperback? @wolverinethad? @Gen_Patton?
 
Land of Flatwater references national broadcasting and reunification at its end, talking about President Harper petitioning to rejoin the UN. I honestly believe with ramped-up transmitters, a rudimentary NPR would be up and running within five-ten years. AM radio has tremendous reach, and simply needs the power allocation. I don't think that would be too hard to achieve, especially in certain places that survived and had AM stations.
 
@Archangel, that’s a good question.

As far as nationwide broadcasting? With an active effort by the new federal government in Washington state in cooperation with active state governments, maybe 2015. That would depend on a hundred things, ranging from fallout affecting areas where you need to put dedicated communications lines, to being able to produce components for television and radio sets. In fact, I’m not certain the 50 states have been reunified by 2017 in the P&S universe.

Anyone else want to weigh in? @Chipperback? @wolverinethad? @Gen_Patton?

So, speaking as someone who was working on Alaska in particular, the state had a series of fully functional back-up AM and FM re-broadcasters out of necessity. Most of the interior of the state is still dependent on NPR for national news, and a lot of the state is still running off TV antennas because cable and/or satellite isn't accessible for them. Part of my storyline for Shelter from the Storm included an assumption that the coastal and interior governments (reconstruction government in Dutch Harbor versus Republic of Alaska government outside Fairbanks) would use dueling radio stations to get news and information out to survivors and neutral communities.

By the early 90's, in the Alaskan context anyway, there'd be a real reliance on the AM and FM networks, shortwave, and HAM radio operators to ensure continuous communication. I'd also assume a resumption of wired and wireless telegraphs in Alaska and probably the Yukon and Northwest Territories as reconstruction commences. A telegraph wire is easy to manufacture even in postwar conditions and rebuilding a network of telegraph lines to tie the state and region together shouldn't be a massive challenge for them. Now, Asia on the other hand, that's a whole other thing that I haven't really gotten to quite yet.
 
Gentlemen, you’ve been very helpful to me so far. AM forming the backbone of a post-war broadcast network makes complete sense to me. So does the rebuilding of telegraph lines, and if Alaska could do it, no reason why the lower 48 couldn’t do the same.

I’m about to work on the next update, btw.
 
It’s come to my attention that I made a mistake regarding one of the on-campus buildings in the previous chapter.

The William T. Young Library didn’t open IRL until 1998. That means I’ll need to go back and rewrite the chapter to remove the reference and refer to the ‘new’ meeting place: the parking lot of the football stadium. That error, of course, is on me.
 
Chapter 7: The Forward and the Brit
Chapter 7

The Forward and the Brit


The wind chill on campus fell into the low 40s, thanks to a brisk wind that came out of nowhere. Clouds obscuring the sunshine made it feel a little colder, and Bearup decided he wanted to get to this gathering place a bit quicker than by foot.

A star-struck student, out of the kindness of his heart, drove Bearup in his pickup truck from Wildcat Lodge to the main parking lot at Commonwealth Stadium. A couple of hundred people, mostly students, were already gathered, and Bearup saw a couple of buses nearby. He got out of the pickup and began walking towards the crowd, looking for someone in charge.

Bearup saw a petite girl in a grey peacoat and blue jeans standing on a crate, long black hair sticking out of a grey beanie protecting her head against the wind. She scanned the crowd while holding a blue megaphone.

He figured she was as much in charge as anyone else.

“Hey,” he said three times, getting her attention by startling her with a near-yell on the third try. She didn’t drop the megaphone, but he had reached out to catch it just in case.

“My word,” the girl said with an English accent. “You don’t have to yell.”

“Sorry,” he replied, a little sheepishly. Ignoring looks from some of the others in the crowd, he pressed on. “I didn’t mean to startle you.”

“I’m sure you didn’t, and in any case what’s done is done. Is there something I can help you with?”

“Depends. You running this thing?”

“I’m one of the organizers.”

Heather Pennington, a sophomore history major and exchange student from Newcastle in the United Kingdom, helped organize the impromptu gathering as a member of UK Students For Peace. She explained a member had been talking with students in Nebraska and New York City about local pro-peace gatherings over something called ‘Arpanet’, which neither of them knew much about (they finally decided it must be a form of ham radio).

Students For Peace were inspired literally overnight by news of peace marches across the country. Her colleague’s friend in Lincoln, Nebraska sold her group’s leadership on the idea of a march here in Lexington: she explained the plan was to march from campus to the office of the Lexington Mayor and hope word of mouth might draw a few hundred more along the way.

“That’s it? Doesn’t sound like enough to get people’s attention,” Bearup said. Or to make it worth my while to make up for missing practice.

“We’re hoping that the media will pay attention and garner the notice of those who can reach those who make the decisions affecting you and I and everyone else,” she said.

“Great,” Bearup muttered, thinking of his prominence as a basketball player and suddenly if coming here was worth it, especially if this thing with the Russians blew over in the next few days.

“I beg your pardon?” Heather asked, twice, jarring him out of his thoughts.

“Oh. I said it’s great. If you can get someone’s attention.”

“It would help, perhaps, if a big, strong footballer like yourself were to participate,” she suggested. “Surely the local telly and papers would pay attention then.”

Oh, yeah, I’m sure they would—waitasecond. “Uh, footballer? Sorry, I don’t play football.”

“You don’t? I would’ve pegged you as a keeper.”

“Keeper?”

Heather put her hand to her mouth to stifle a laugh. “Sorry, I forgot. This is America. You Yanks call it soccer. You must play forward, then, if you’re not a keeper.”

“Er, I actually play basketball—“

“Oh? You’re not one of the—“

“Yup. I play for the Wildcats,” Bearup replied in a lower voice, not wanting to draw any more attention to himself than he had to. “I am a forward, though. And my name is Bret.”

“Heather,” she said, putting out her hand. He shook it, and they told the other about themselves. He was from Long Island in New York state east of New York City, a reserve on the basketball team and a law student. She was from Newcastle in northeastern England, having transferred from Northumbria University to spend a year in the States. “My mum didn’t want me to leave home,” she said. “I told her she had to let her little bird fly off some time. She couldn’t say much, since I got my independent streak from her.”

She had spoken with her mother that morning. The news cycle in Britain, as in the States, was dominated by talk of war with the Soviets. Heather said her mother was very surprised on hearing about the Kentucky basketball game being played the night before, and about the scheduled game with Vanderbilt on Sunday. “Mum couldn’t believe it. She told me the Football Association called off all matches indefinitely.”

“Some of the college conferences here did the same thing, though the SEC’s playing on,” he said.

“Mum said ‘no football, no sports, just the news and bloody Protect and Survive’.”

“‘Protect and Survive’?”

“It’s a programme the BBC runs every hour explaining what you do in the event of a nuclear attack. Do they have anything like that, in America?"

Bearup’s mind flashed back to a movie he and his then-girlfriend saw a few months ago, The Day After, and the scene where the twin mushroom clouds over Kansas City were seen from the interstate.

“No, not that I’m aware of,” he said. “Maybe they do.”

“All the more reason for you to join in this march,” Heather said. “Perhaps if they see you, a basketballer, among us, it’ll get someone’s attention.”

“I wish I were as confident as you are about that.”

“Confident? I’m bloody scared, Bret. There’s something else my mum asked me to do. She asked me to stay here, in America. She thinks I’ll be safer here if things go as badly as they could.”

He paused to consider his answer. “Stay? Me, I’d be on the first plane home—“

“Why are you here, Bret?”

“What?”

“Why are you here in Kentucky? Why aren’t you on the first plane back to Long Island?”

He had no idea.
 
By the way, the mayor of Lexington at this time is Scotty Baesler, a Democrat who later IRL served in the U.S. House from 1993-99.

We’ve seen in detail in @Chipperback and @wolverinethad ’s threads that the Nebraska and Florida governments were as well-prepared as they could be for nuclear war.

I don’t plan to get into that level of detail here, but Kentucky’s government is playing catch-up, as are its neighboring states. Frankfort had a rudimentary plan in place by January 1; the Cuban incident near the Orange Bowl was what got the state government moving.

Although no one will talk on the record about where state operations are being relocated, there’s a reason for Centre College and Mammoth Cave being blocked off and for people from the Governor’s office seriously asking about the practicality of using coal mines as long-term shelters.
 
I suspect if there is going to be a dividing line between states that plan and states that don't, it'll largely be based upon proximity to A: Soviet bases or B: major military targets, like, say, large SAC/missile bases, NORAD, etc. So, the Rockies, Nebraska, Florida, Alaska, maybe Missouri and Arkansas (Clinton is a damned smart man, despite his foibles), and the Gulf States will all be well-prepared, the rest of the nation not so much because they haven't had it as firmly wired in their minds.
 
Chapter 8
“I’m all in.”


“What do you mean? ‘All in’ to what?”


Bret hadn’t thought about why he was still in Lexington until Heather asked him the question moments before. He had no answer for her, and she didn’t follow up on his attempt to change the subject. “Bret. Why are you here? Why aren’t you back home with your loved ones?”


“Uh…basketball. My team needs me.”


“Bollocks. A foolish game—“


“You’ve spent how much time in Kentucky and you think basketball is foo—“


“You’re avoiding my question, Bret Bearup,” Heather interjected, her hands on her hips, looking him eye-to-eye despite being her 5-foot-6 height and the 13-inch height differential between them. “You need to ask yourself what you’re doing here and why. I’m stuck here, Bret. I can’t go home. I’m trying to change what I fear is inevitable. What about you?”


Only then did Bret notice the dozens of people around them listening in on the conversation. He didn’t notice the Reporter’s car speed into the stadium parking lot, nor the Reporter jump out of the vehicle after it screeched to a stop.


He didn’t answer her question.


“Now or never, everyone, let’s go!” yelled one of the organizers somewhere behind Bret. He turned and saw people begin walking in his direction, and in moments he found himself in a mass of people walking, away from Commonwealth Stadium. He turned to Heather, and she wasn’t there, and kept walking while trying to find her.


“Cool, man.” Bret turned to his left and saw a pudgy, half-disheveled student wearing a University of Kentucky toboggan and sweatshirt, star-struck from being in the presence of a Bluegrass celebrity.


“Excuse me?” Bret said as he continued to look for Heather.


“I mean, that’s cool, man, that a basketball player’s doing this. Marching with us,” the young man said. “I’m Paul. I’m from Louisville. Big-time Cats fan all my life.”


“Bret…you probably already know that.”


“Uh, yeah. Saw you guys play Florida. Hope it wasn’t The Last Game.”


“Not as far as I know,” Bret replied, remembering he had just intentionally skipped practice and that he was likely in deep trouble with coach Hall as a result. “We play at Vandy on Sunday.”


“I hope,” Paul replied. “I got friends in Nebraska. Some of them are marching for peace in Omaha. Talking to them helped inspire me to get off my butt and try to do something, to tell Reagan and Ogarkov to stop, you know?”


“Yeah. I get it.”


“That why you’re here?”


“You know…I guess so. I guess I want peace, too.”


“I’m scared to death.”


“What?”


“I’m scared, man. Last night, I had a nightmare. The mushroom cloud from that movie last fall, in Kansas after a nuclear war. Dozens of it, all over the freakin’ place. I was somewhere near here, trying to get out of town when they went off. I woke up screaming, man, freaked out my roommate. I was alone.”


“Alone? You said your roommate was there.”


“The dream. In the dream. Everyone I knew was killed by one of those bombs. That’s what got me to commit to this. Not my buddies in Nebraska, not my family back home. That dream. I tell ya, man, I’m scared to death. I got a bad feeling about all of this, we’re not gonna make it—“


“Come on. They won’t go that far.”


“Nobody thought they’d go as far as they have. I want to see my family, man. I want to live. Don’t you?”


Bret pondered that, as the group continued its brisk walk from campus towards downtown.


again, a group of two- to three-hundred people marching from the UK campus into downtown, towards Mayor Scotty Baesler’s office. The crowd appears calm, so far. I’ve been told there have been no incidents involving this moving crowd of people apparently inspired by peace marches across the country, and I’ve also just been passed a note which says ‘police are shutting down roads along the route’. No word as to what that means for local traffic, but if you’re downtown or headed downtown, you might want to change your route, and stay tuned to 59 WVLK for updates as the station gets them


we go now to WKYT sports anchor Rob Bromley with a bit of related news on the march.


Barbara, I’m told that there are several UK student-athletes who are marching with the crowd, including basketball player Bret Bearup


Cliff Hagan’s secretary heard her boss curse, quite loudly, from behind the locked door of his office. He’d later apologize to her for the outburst, but he currently had other things on his mind.


He picked up his phone and placed a call. “Get me Joe,” he barked to the student manager on the line.


Four minutes later, head coach Joe B. Hall picked up the receiver on his desk. “Cliff, we got a situation here—“


“You’re looking for Bearup?”


Hall paused. “Well, in fact, yeah, we’re looking for him. He’s supposed to be HERE. Is he there?”


“No, but I know where you can find him. Turn on Channel 27.”


“Channel 27…why in hell would he be there?”


“Not there, Joe. In that damn march.”


“What march?”


“Turn on the TV in your office, dammit! Bromley’s still talking…he knows more than WE do. Get him back here, I want to talk to him!”


Hearing the click on the other end, Hall turned his TV to channel 27, watching Bromley discuss Bearup being in the crowd and speculating on the other players. Hall groaned, then saw two of his assistant coaches, Leonard Hamilton and Dick Parsons, standing outside in the hallway. He waved them into his office and explained the situation.


“You two make sure the other players are where they’re supposed to be and run things until I get back — and before you ask, I don’t know when that’ll be,” Hall said. “I’m driving down there to try to get to him before that crowd reaches the Mayor’s office—“


“They’ll think you’re a part of it too, Joe,” Parsons said. “Send a manager there.”


“Bret won’t listen to a manager, but he’ll listen to me. He’d better. Cliff Hagan’s pissed over this, and I don’t blame him. I want to wring his damn neck over not being here and telling somebody where he went. Cliff wants to talk to him, too.”


“Yell at him, more like it,” Hamilton said. “I’d like to know what the hell Bearup was thinking, too.”


Hall got up from his chair and stepped from behind his desk. “I think I can head them off before they get to where they’re going.” Hall’s phone rang and he picked it up. Hagan was on the other line.


“Joe. I just spoke with Mr. Singletary,” Hagan said of Otis Singletary, the university’s president. “He wants everyone to stay put.”


“Stay put?”


“Singletary says it’s some kind of First Amendment thing. He wants to talk about this thing, whatever it is, so I’m headed to his office. He did tell me he was told there’d be legal issues if we tried to punish him for going on the march.”


“Hell, we don’t even know why he’s there!”


“No, but we can’t punish him for it. Maybe for skipping practice without permission. He also told me he’s got friends watching the crowd along the route, and guess who’s in the back trying to catch up to Mr. Bearup?”


“Better not be anyone else on my team.” Hall looked up and saw only Hamilton, who mouthed ‘no as far as I know’. Parsons stepped out of the room to talk with the team’s longtime equipment manager, Bill Keightley, in the hallway.


“Tipton,” Hagan replied. Jerry Tipton, the beat writer from the Lexington Herald-Leader assigned to cover the team. “Somehow he found out about this march and sped down here. Got his car towed from the stadium parking lot for illegal parking.”


“Good Lord,” Hall groaned. “That’s a good enough reason for me to try to get to Bearup first before that bastard—“


“All the more reason to stay where you’re at,” Hagan said. “The whole damn media’s gonna be down there. Wait ‘till they get back. Then we talk with him.”


ESPN has learned from multiple sources that the Southeastern Conference presidents were involved in a conference call earlier today and unanimously voted to play through the weekend. One source said the decision was the presidents, quote, ‘telling the Russians as a group we won’t stop playing on account of them’. Another source said the decision was made independently from the Big Eight Conference, that ‘the league respects the decision made by the Big Eight was best for its membership, and the SEC presidents think their decision is best for the SEC and its fans’.
 
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