Awesome story!
Thanks
-BadMan
On 11/15/12, mail.bobparks.com <oliver@bobparks.com> wrote:
> What a great story! Sad too. Thanks for posting it, Woody.
>
> Oliver Barry, CRS, GRI
> Real Estate Broker
> Bob Parks, LLC
> 1517 Hunt Club Blvd
> Gallatin TN 37066
> 615-972-4239
> 615-826-4040
> Sent from my iPhone
>
> Begin forwarded message:
>
>> From: Woody Bass <gatorrrrrr@gmail.com>
>> Date: November 14, 2012 8:20:49 PM CST
>> To: WXIA <gatornews@googlegroups.com>
>> Subject: [gatornews] When UF Said 'Let There Be Lights' at Florida Field,
>> Poekel Devised Plan - GatorZone.com Mobile
>> Reply-To: gatornews+owners@googlegroups.com
>>
>
>> http://www.gatorzone.com/mobile/news/24314
>>
>> When UF Said 'Let There Be Lights' at Florida Field, Poekel Devised Plan
>>
>> GAINESVILLE, Fla. – On Page 84 of his master's thesis is where one story
>> ended and another one began for Charles Axel Poekel.
>>
>> The page is dated Aug. 27, 1938. Poekel's thesis titled "Design of
>> Flood-Lighting for Football Stadia" was approved that day, signed off by
>> four members of UF's College of Engineering, including Dean Joseph Weil.
>>
>> Almost a year earlier in September 1937 Weil received a letter from
>> Florida assistant athletic director Percy Beard, who was exploring the
>> possibility of adding lights to Florida Field. The Florida football team
>> needed a lighted field to escape the heat and to be able to practice at
>> night, and Beard asked if Weil and his staff could "prepare an estimate of
>> the cost of this installation."
>>
>> Poekel, an electrical engineering graduate student at the time, had
>> recently completed his undergraduate degree at UF and was in search of his
>> thesis topic.
>>
>> A light went off. Poekel went to work.
>>
>> *****
>>
>> Poekel's thesis ended up as the plan UF used to install the lights that
>> first lit up Florida Field, which was built in 1930 and expanded many
>> times over the years. The first night game came several years later in
>> September 1950 when the Gators hosted The Citadel.
>>
>> By that time Poekel was settled for more than a decade in New Jersey,
>> where for the next seven decades he would add numerous accomplishments to
>> his life's story. His contribution to UF's football history received
>> recognition in early 2010 when he returned to Gainesville for the first
>> time in more than 70 years to be honored as the UF College of
>> Engineering's Alumnus of the Year.
>>
>> The reunion was special for those involved. When Cammy Abernathy, UF's
>> current dean of the College of Engineering, asked Poekel why it had been
>> so long since he had been back to UF, he responded, "I've been busy."
>>
>> Poekel was thrilled to be recognized by his alma mater and received a
>> special surprise when school officials took him to Ben Hill Griffin
>> Stadium, took him to the 50-yard line, and flipped on the lights in his
>> honor.
>>
>> "I bet Thomas Edison wouldn't get this kind of treatment,'' Poekel told
>> The Florida Engineer.
>>
>>
>>
>> Photo: Poekel as a UF student in the 1930s and a diagram in his master's
>> thesis.
>>
>> Poekel was scheduled to return to campus earlier this month during the
>> weekend of the Florida-Missouri football game. The College of Engineering
>> planned to unveil a plaque at Ustler Hall – the building that used to be
>> old Florida Gym and where Poekel met Mary Alice Webster, his late wife of
>> 63 years – in Poekel's honor.
>>
>> He planned to attend the football game, meet the first two recipients of a
>> scholarship named in his honor, and celebrate his 97th birthday.
>>
>> "We were really looking forward to it,'' said Charles Poekel Jr., his son
>> and a New York City attorney. "One of the greatest things in his 90s was
>> the reconnection with Florida. That really inspired him."
>>
>> A few days prior to the trip, Poekel developed an infection that required
>> a hospital stay. Then Hurricane Sandy blew ashore and cut off power at his
>> Essex Fells, N.J., home for several days and canceled travel plans to
>> Florida. Instead of celebrating his birthday at The Swamp, Poekel was
>> forced to remain in the hospital, where he developed pneumonia.
>>
>> The family was able to take the Poekel home but on Nov. 7 he passed away
>> at 97, leaving behind a significant legacy besides his role in lighting
>> Florida Field.
>>
>> "I tell people he didn't live just 97 years, but 97 great years,'' Charles
>> Jr. said. "You can't ask for much more than that. He battled really
>> heroically. They gave him the strongest possible antibiotics and they
>> weren't enough."
>>
>> *****
>>
>> Poekel was just getting started all those years ago at UF.
>>
>> While working at Curtiss-Wright Aeronautics five years after turning in
>> his master's thesis, Poekel invented an anti-icing method to prevent
>> propeller blades from icing on an airplane. He eventually earned a U.S.
>> patent for his work and the invention became the industry standard for
>> de-icing airplane propellers.
>>
>> Poekel's creative ways ran in the family. He moved to Florida to live with
>> his grandparents after his mom died when he was 11. His grandfather was
>> well-known Danish yacht and boat designer T.S. Poekel.
>>
>> Later in life Poekel designed equipment used in the development of the
>> first hydrogen bomb while at Gould and Eberhardt Engineering in Hoboken,
>> N.J. He married Mary Alice, a Florida State graduate, in 1941.
>>
>> He also created and owned C.A. Poekel & Company, a real estate brokerage
>> firm, Poekel Electric and Poekel Travel Bureau.
>>
>> A lifelong boxing fan, late in life Poekel developed into a huge fan of
>> Manny Pacquiao and continued to travel extensively well into his 90s. He
>> loved to swim and was active in masonry, a skill he acquired during his
>> time in Gainesville.
>>
>> It makes sense that his favorite singer was Bing Crosby, whose song "Young
>> at Heart" was a favorite of Poekel's.
>>
>> "That really sort of captures the way he was,'' Charles Jr. said. "That's
>> why it's tough on all of us. He didn't seem so old. He seemed so young at
>> heart. He was always someone who sort of looked ahead and never looked
>> back."
>>
>> As Poekel rested in a New Jersey hospital on Nov. 2, a banner arrived from
>> UF's College of Engineering.
>>
>> "To our favorite Gator engineer,'' it read.
>>
>> "He really loved to see that,'' Charles Jr. said. "This would have been
>> the highlight of his life if he had made it down there for that Missouri
>> game weekend. We want to continue on with his legacy and come down there
>> in future years."
>>
>> Maybe they can come watch a Gators' night game. That seems about right.
>>
>> AT A GLANCE
>>
>> A memorial service for Poekel is scheduled for Nov. 24, the day of the
>> Florida-Florida State game.
>>
>> The family requests that in lieu of flowers, donations can be made to the
>> "UF Foundation" to support the Charles A. Poekel Sr. Endowed Scholarship
>> Fund, c/o College of Engineering Development Office, P.O. Box 116575,
>> Gainesville, Fla. 32611.
>>
>>
>>
>> Woody (via iPhone)
>> --
>> GATORS: ONE VOICE ON SATURDAY - NO VOICE ON SUNDAY!
>> 1996 National Football Champions | 2006 National Basketball Champions
>> 2006 National Football Champions | 2007 National Basketball Champions
>> 2008 National Football Champions |
>> Three Heisman Trophy winners: Steve Spurrier (1966), Danny Wuerffel
>> (1996),
>> Tim Tebow (2007) - Visit our website at www.gatornet.us
>
> --
> GATORS: ONE VOICE ON SATURDAY - NO VOICE ON SUNDAY!
> 1996 National Football Champions | 2006 National Basketball Champions
> 2006 National Football Champions | 2007 National Basketball Champions
> 2008 National Football Champions |
> Three Heisman Trophy winners: Steve Spurrier (1966), Danny Wuerffel (1996),
> Tim Tebow (2007) - Visit our website at www.gatornet.us
--
Sent from my mobile device
--
GATORS: ONE VOICE ON SATURDAY - NO VOICE ON SUNDAY!
1996 National Football Champions | 2006 National Basketball Champions
2006 National Football Champions | 2007 National Basketball Champions
2008 National Football Champions |
Three Heisman Trophy winners: Steve Spurrier (1966), Danny Wuerffel (1996),
Tim Tebow (2007) - Visit our website at www.gatornet.us
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