Chancellor Victor Boschini came up with the idea during the dead heat of summer … hoping the University could give away something that might make people more comfortable during the afternoon home games during what promised to be a few more weeks of hot weather. Other options ---visors, water bottles, cups – were discarded in favor of the individual fans.
Margaret Kelly, executive director of Community Projects, took on the task of making it happen. She ordered the fans from Magna Marketing in late July and began organizing a task force for assembling the unique gadgets when they arrived on campus in early September.
Stored in Daniel-Meyer Coliseum were 19 pallets of fans in individual boxes, plus two pallets filled with AAA batteries. Now, for the fun part … dismantling each fan to install the batteries, fill with water, reassemble, dry, test, insert back in their boxes and put into large cartons for transport to the stadium.
Margaret let it be known that Facility Services employees could earn overtime by participating in the assembly line operation set up in the concourse of Daniel-Meyer. Joined by volunteers from other areas of campus, the group began the monumental task on Wednesday, Sept. 7 with an average of 25 workers on the job each day (including Saturday and Sunday) until it was completed a week later, on Wednesday, Sept. 14.
That’s a total of 1,225 man hours and 34,560 fans. Pizza, snacks and box lunches sustained the crew during the long, weekend shifts.
When it was over, they whooped it up in celebration and shared a big cake brought in for housekeeper Delfina Granados’ 71st birthday. “She was a work horse,” Margaret says. “She came every day and worked at the last staging area, putting the completed fans back in their boxes and packing those into the larger cartons. She got to where she could get 157 fans packed in 20 minutes!”
Those who worked the assembly line include:
AMPARO RAMIREZ
ANA REYES
ARACELY (SHELLY) LOPEZ
ARMANDO ALONSO
BENJAMIN RODGERS
BETH MCLAUGHLIN
CAROLINA ENRIQUEZ
CHAD PEARCE
CHRIS BRIONES
CHRISTINA BEDOLLA
DELFINA GRANADOS
DEUNTAE FINKLEA
DIANA MARTINEZ
DOROTHY HOLLAND
ELBA McCURLEY
ELENA GARCIA
ELODIA AVELAR
ESPERANZA SOLIS
EVANGELINA HERNANDEZ
FELIPE BARRIOS
FRANCISCA MARTINEZ
FRANCISCO MUNOZ
HECTOR MACIAS
HENRY BOSQUES
HOMERO TORRES
JERRY FLEMING
JOANNE CRUMP
JOHN DAVIS
JOHN SORIA
JOSE CASTILLO
JOSEFINA CARDENAS
KENDRICK SHAW
LEONIE FENELON
LILIA BECERRA
MARIA BARRIOS
MARIA BOLING
MARIA FLORES
MARIA GONZALEZ
MARIA MALAGON
MARIA MORA
MARIA PEREZ
MARIA VEGA
MARICIO CRUZ-LEON
MARIZA GARCIA
MICHAEL LAMBERT
MIRIAM CALDERON
PATRICIA AVINA
PATRICIA RODRIGUEZ
PEDRO GARCIA
RAMIRO FLORES
REINALDO GARCIA
ROSALBA LOMAS
ROSALBA MARTINEZ
SABINA FALCON
SAMUEL VILLARREAL
SANTOS ROJAS
SUSANA MEDINA
TERESA BALCAZAR
JOANNIE SMITH
JOSE CARPINTEYRO
JEANNIE CHAFFEE
ALLISON CRARY, LAUREN BIRMINGHAM, REBEKAH MACK AND GREG BLACKWELL