I was the operations officer at Frankfurt Tech Control and Company HQ from May 1972 - until the switch over to 102nd Sig Bn in 1974. I was there with my wife, and first lived in Bad Vilbel (civilian) and only later (once I was promoted to 1st Lt.) did we get an appartment in Army dependents quarters. Maybe at Gibbs (but it has been a "few years.") (Note: I know in Frankfurt Co A just did the Multichannel M/W and there was another Signal unit that managed the phones and switches in the Farben building.)

I was trained for multi channel M/W, which was 90 percent of what Co A was operating in 1972 - mostly Motorola 300, with some Siemens (for NATO links I think, with German tech support).

Frankfurt Tech Control managed links (multichannel - microwave line of site - except for the one TROPO scatter link from Bocksberg to Berlin) and stations at Frankfurt, Zweibruecken, Breitsol, Kaiserslautern, Wuerzburg. I believe we also had links to the Air Force at Frankfurt and Wiesbaden Air Bases and the Air Force relay site at Feldberg/Taunus. The station at Bocksberg was shut down soon after I arrived in county.

What the folks at Tech Control facility did - was mostly off hours, contact other Tech Control sites around the world - and do "quality" check on each channel. A set series of frequencies or data was sent and the other end would measure and LOG the "quality" - then adjust and retest if required. It took several weeks to complete the testing of all voice and data, and crypto lines. THEN start again. Some times late on weekends the guys would try for a round-the-world link and see how the quality was after 12,000 miles. (Tech control could also LINK up to state-side tech control (at night) to get the guys a few "freebie" phone calls home. ALL in the name of Quality checks - you understand.)

Maybe I should ADD that any time the Tech Control would find a LINK or channel OUT OF SPEC, and not able to adjust within tolerance, faulty modules identified and replacement parts would be ordered. We had almost daily runs to the Depot in Manheim, OR to another site - if a part was located.

Threre was a HF site was next to the PIZZA place at one of the other kasernes. One night when we went to pick up a pizza - lightning hit the towers - 3 times while we were waiting for the pizza.

The microwave tower and Tech Control were behind IG Farben - adjacent to the Officers club (the Casino). Looking at the map above, circled in Green was the HQ Co & A Co building from 72-74, RED is the MW and tech control building. Building “1” was V Corps HQ (aka IG Farben bldg.) We also had a multichannel site at Darmstadt.

In my time there - the HQ offices and Supply etc., were on the ground floor of what seemed like an old apartment building - Not in one of the kasernes. The second and third floors were the enlisted quarters. NOT very secure at the time. (Right after Baader- Meinhof raids) Near German pubs. It was a few blocks from IG Farben. Pretty near the PX. When the consolidation with 102nd happened - the building was returned to civilian use. Admin Offices then moved into IG Farben, as part of 102nd.

68th Sig Bn HQ was at Stuttgart as I recall and Gen Swensen was Commanding. Other than at one "Officers Call" in Garmisch, we (Co A) did not interact with the other 68th companies.

As mentioned, in 1974 the 68th was absorbed into the 102nd (I think). We closed the Bad Kreuznach site and some links were reassigned and/or consolidated, as the new newfangled SAT stations were going online. Two officers from Co A and a few EM were assigned with HHD 102nd. Several others, like myself, were transferred elsewhere by Sept 1974 – myself to a DoD contact site near DC.

The Nellingen CRCS

CRCS, as I recall, stood for Consolidated Radio Control Station. (Webmaster Note: other sources stated this meant Communications Relay Control Center...?)

We shared a building on Nellingen with HHC’s communications/radio equipment shop. The yellow building in the upper left hand corner of the aerial photo from the 1950s is the building that I am referring to. This building appears to have two very large garage type doors.  The 'smaller' door to the far left of these two doors was the entrance to my radio site!

This was where 'everyone', all of the sites belonging to the battalion, sent their stuff to get repaired.  The NCOIC of that facility was an SFC Sheffield.  He had on his staff a Spec/6 Papp.  Papp took real good care of us!  He was always in our shop fixing or improving something.  We occupied our own section which was about a third of the building.  The building was almost adjacent to the Nellingen Gymnasium & Roller Skating rink.  It sat in back of the motor pool & in front of the fields that were part of the WWII airfield.  Out back in the middle of a field we had a large antenna which was know as a Wideband Vertical.  To the right of our portion of the warehouse we kept 2 large generators which provided us with our emergency electrical backup.

Each of our radio sets; KWT-6s & KWM-2s, were preset or tuned to a specific frequency. Each set was subsequently ID by us to let everyone know who was on duty at the site what the primary, secondary, etc. frequencies were during their shift. These signs were moveable and were typically moved from set to set throughout the day or a particular shift depending on what specific frequencies were being used by the CEMETERY net.

The Wideband Vertical antenna mentioned above was a conical shaped contraption; at least that's what I remember about the one we had out back. It was a VHF antenna; used for both sending & receiving. There are numerous descriptions of this antenna on the internet.

In addition to this we did have numerous cobra heads coming into the station that were each 'cut' for different frequencies. A cobra head was a metal contraption that was used on dipole antennas. This contraption resembled the head of a cobra. Even though we had all of our sets on the Wideband Vertical; we also had several Cobra heads as backup. This type of antenna was used primarily for mobile setup; they could easily be assembled or dis-assembled for field exercises.

Please keep in mind that the aerial image of the area around the gym is from the 1950's.  The terrain changed significantly from then to 1966 when I was there. Again, looking at the image our wideband vertical was directly behind us but at a great distance.  The road to the right of our building that wraps around behind our building (tanks & other vehicles in the image) wasn't there anymore in 1966.  At least I don't remember it being there.

Our antenna would've been on the other side of that road; probably in the field where those vehicles are parked in the aerial of the CRCS building (above).

The grassy area to the left of our radio site was where we kept our 2 generators. We very rarely had to cut the grass because a local farmer used to bring his sheep through this area and they would eat all of the grass

CEMETERY 3 also 'doubled' as BOLD JUSTICE.  He basically ran the entire CEMETERY show.  Once in awhile, he would receive traffic from the great one up in the sky, ACTIVE MOUNTAIN.   CEMETERY 3 would then poll his NCS sites and we in turn would poll our sites. CEMETERY 3 under his alias BOLD JUSTICE also ran a net that was comprised of the Net Control Sites; CEMETERY 5, CEMETERY 1 & us.  There were probably several others but I forget.  I do remember RINGSIDE & MAPLEWOOD, however. I never knew who RINGSIDE & MAPLEWOOD were; I'm not even sure that one of them wasn't even ARMY; but may have been Air Force.  I'd heard that rumor while I was over there.

I never knew the logic behind the regional breakdown (between the two signal battalions or between the lettered companies of the 68^th) or how they arrived at the numbering system for the CEMETERY Net.  Most of the sites that were in my net were located in Northern Germany. EG:  My backup NCS was CEMETERY 132 who was in Barnsdorf.  He was responsible for taking over the CEMETERY 6 net whenever we went down or off the air for whatever reason. Again, I don't know what sites the 447th had in their net.  I never even knew they ran their own CEMETERY NCS.

The equipment that we used at CEMETERY 6 were KWT-6s & KWM-2s.  We didn't use the standard Army 'ANGRY' equipment ever unless we went mobile (it did happen once while I was there).  I would suspect that the individual sites in our net may have used this equipment.  I never knew.

Every half hour on the hour CEMETERY 6 would poll every site in our net. These were referred to as Radio Checks. We had roughly 12 - 15 sites in our net.  E.g: CEMETERY 57, CEMETERY 58, CEMETERY 64 & CEMETERY 132. If someone didn't answer when we called they were 'logged out'. This was a big deal to some people; see who could get the most 'log outs' in a month.  CEMETERY would also perform his own radio check polling w/his NCS sites. Sometimes we would receive traffic from CEMETERY 3 that would contain 'special' messages for the individual sites to convey to their superiors.

As far as operating the CEMETERY Net, HHC 68th did very little for us.  They were the Battalion Headquarters for the entire 68th Sig Bn.  We lived in their barracks, drew our supplies from them (S-4?) etc.  Maybe, it was because of their proximity to the Nellingen Transceiver site (yet another name for us).They had very little to do with us. I think they saw that which probably led to the decision to make us part of B CO. in Ulm.

CORRECTION
(Source: Donald Elmore)
Walter, in the diagram above, it shows that Cemetery 5 (CRCS) is in Giessen. Cemetery 5 (CRCS) was in Nellingen, not Giessen.

I have no proof, but I remember for 19 months from June 1964 to January 1966 listening to Cemetery 5 make radio checks.
For Example: Cemetery, Cemetery, this is Cemetery 5, with a radio check, Over.

Then occasionally Cemetery 5 would come over the radio and say this: Cemetery 35, Cemetery 35, this is Cemetery 5, over. I would then say: Cemetery 5, this is Cemetery 35, Over: Then Cemetery 5 would say: Cemetery 35, request you take control of the net and make a radio check, Over: And then I would say, Cemetery 5, this is Cemetery 35, Roger, Out.

At this time I would then proceed with making the radio check.

In all my time there, I never heard Cemetery 6 do anything except answer to a radio check.

Remember also, that for two years from June 1968 to June 1970I was the Company Operations Sergeant in Giessen and I had a Collins KWM-2A set up in the Operations Room at Company Headquarters and was monitoring the net. Cemetery 5 was CRCS, Net Control Station at Nellingen. Cemetery 59 was the Alternate Net Control Station.

Also, from November 1971 to February 1974, I was in Battalion S-3. And from February 1974 to June 1975 I was again in Giessen as the First Sergeant. I can tell you that definitely, CRCS was not in Giessen.

So for a period of 3 1/2 years I was on the Net. I cannot see how my memory can be so far off. I hope this helps in some way.