European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - October 13, 1987, Darmstadt, Hesse Aero the United stare at College football fever Sint Bou so do entrepreneur who an game to profit from the sport cashing in on College football by Field new York times he Start of the College football season is always a Happy Lime Tor Jack Garbrick. Not Hal the games themselves mean a whole lot to him. He Nover watches them. He flies Over them. Most of the year his meal ticket is leasing and operating Ferris wheels and tilt a whirls at carnivals and fairs. Bui piloting planes is his abiding interest. Five years ago he had a Chance to buy some lettering for banners thai Are dragged behind air planes. A High bulb Wen on. Why not sell time Over Beaver stadium during the Home games of the Kittany Lions of Pennsylvania state University it was one of those ideas right for its time. The Nellany Lions were a sizzling hoi team last year of course they were the National champions. Every homa game therefore Jack Garbrick has three Cessna 172 s buzzing overhead lowing As Many As 15 messages a game marry me Ethel greetings from Pennsylvania Christmas tree growers. The Price is $200 an hour during the game with a bargain rate before and afterwards. I would t say i m getting Rich off the banners Garbrick said. But it s Good work and gives me another excuse to fire up the the planes were crowding the sky again recently when the 1987 College season opened and the sons trounced Bowling Green rewarding the coach Joe Palermo with his 200th career Victory. Hundreds of other local businesses also cashed in on that contest and again sept. 12. When the Lions played Host to the University of Alabama. Davidson Florist sold a dozen or to Blue and White mum football cof sages each saturday at $2.95 apiece. The convenience stores end Gas stations in town pumped about 30 percent More gasoline than usual and the learning station child development Center took in about 20 kids for its special football saturday Day care sessions. Add up the mum and the gasoline and the baby sitting fees end la becomes obvious that College football is big business and not Only to the universities and television networks. A recently completed study by Perm state s Center for regional business analysis in fact concluded Hal last year s seven Home games rained More than $�0.4 million on state College and its environs. Add the Ripple effect of those dollars through the local Economy and the total Impact comes to $40.3 Mahx Rebr $5.7 million a saturday. Similar showers of dollars deluge a goodly number of communities around the country that happen to Field College teams Ann Arbor mich., profits by being the Hometown of the University of Michigan wolverines. Lincoln neb would t live As Well without the University of Nebraska games. South Bend. Ind. Adds to its economic standards because of the fighting Irish of notre Dame. For state College the Good times Are even better than the new study indicated among other things the inquiry did t include the 32,100 fans who live within 25 Miles of stale College but Only the spending by the 54,000 who arrive from farther away. Nor did it count the annual Blue and White scrimmage game which itself draws 40,000 spectators. The Survey did reveal admirable examples of dedication among alumni however. Fans covered an average distance of 186 Miles each Way to see the games a few thought nothing of coming in from the Wesl coast and Texas and spent an average of $54. Some of them of course lost control. A respondent from Denver owned up that after one game he lugged Home $400 Worth of Penn stale jackets to shirts Caps and everything else he could get hold of with the College name on it. It s a pretty amazing phenomenon said Rodney a. Erickson director of the regional business Center. We always know that the economic Impact was big. We just never imagined it was this state College itself in t big at All. Walk Down College Avenue and Ihen Allen Street which runs perpendicular to College and you be pretty much done the downtown. The population numbers about 30,000 not counting the 34,000 students at Penn stale. Sprawled in the Shadow of mount Kittany the own Lecup a Leafy gently rolling land thai was a Hunting ground for indians before people began playing College football. Kittany is a derivative of an Indian word meaning single Mountain it started to coalesce into a town in 1855 when construction began on Farmer s High school the forerunner of Penn state which itself opened in 1871. On the weekend of a game Rivers of Metal Fil every artery into stale College. Hotels and motels Hal Are often less than half full on other weekends Are booked months in Advance. Some lans out of necessity put up a half hour away in Lewis own or Khoona some even sleep in Harrisburg. A Good 90 Miles from the stadium. Alt of the hotels in the area enforce a two Day minimum stay on football weekends and rates typically go skyward. The Sheraton for example gets 40 percent Axxe on weekends Lor the nighty competitive games but Only 20 percent More Lor games against Pushover. Sloping Coffee in the dining room Jim Raytek the manager of the nil any lion inn. Remarked on the flood of guests "a3 much As two thirds of the hotel is people who come every year. On May 5.1931, we had an opening dance Here. A woman from Pittsburgh was there. She Silil comes for the games. Her husband died tuesday october 13,1987 two years ago. But she still comes. There s a Man from new Jersey in his 80s who takes a series of three buses to get Here. Me walks the last leg 400 Yards or so carrying his bags. We be offered to pick him up at the bus Stop but he refuses. Very Independent some hotels stage special attractions. For 10 years the Kittany lion inn has booked the tarnished six to play in the sitting room on those weekends they re a Dixieland band formerly the Golden seven but they lost a member. They play the old standards. They also throw in the Penn stale fight song everybody cheers. Kidding by. They May throw in the opposing team s fight song they Are almost lynched. If they recognize anyone in the crowd there s no telling what they la play or say. The visiting team hears none of this. Due to longstanding tradition ii puts up at the Holiday inn. A few coaches though Don t want their players in town archrival University of Pittsburgh for example sleeps in Altoona the Holiday inn consists of seven buildings and management customarily quarantines the opponents in one of them. Aware that these guests Wilt be about As Welcome As the red army the Motel instructs Security to keep an extra Eye peeled. The town police also make ii a Point to patrol the Holiday inn with stepped up vigilance. Nobody s Ever attacked the team said Susan Faust the Holiday inn s manager but we Don l take chances. You can never Tell what a Penn state fan might Bob Dannamar is an easy going Man who gives the impression that it would Lake something on the order of a meteor Shower to get him riled. On football saturdays though his head rings. He manages the University Park Airport nestled in the Hills hard by the stadium. When Penn slate is pitted against a run Mohe Mill competitor roughly 30 private air planes Fly in for the game and Park at the Airport. When a powerhouse such As Alabama or notre Dame comes to town he can count on 60. Being thai University Park is smaller than o Hare he finds he has to shut Down one of the two runways and use it to Park the aircraft. We try to be As imaginative As we Dannaker said we Park them every the Airport picks up Landing tees of $5 for a single engine plane and $24 for a . More importantly fuel sales soar. Dannaker guesses that he probably pumps about 1,000 Gallons of fuel on a Normal Day and three or tour times As much on a football saturday at $1.55 a gallon. It always surprises me that Lafis would Fly in from hundreds and even thousands of Miles away he said. But Penn stale fans Well they seem a Lille weird Penn state licenses 832 companies and people to use its name on products for a 6 percent split of the profits. The Money adds up. In the latest year these products yielded record royalties of $516.168, which went to the school s general scholarship fund. The stars and stripes Page 13
