NC State Basketball
NC State Noise Meter Heading to the Reynolds Museum
When Reynolds Coliseum went under renovation, one of the things I was most excited about was the fact that they’d have a little museum to commemorate the history of the storied stadium where I grew up watching the Wolfpack. Now that it’s nearly complete we are starting to learn more and more about what made it into that museum.
Yesterday, news broke that the Wolfpack would be bringing the ever famous ‘noise meter’ to the museum. If you remember a few years back Tim Peeler found the noise meter in the basement of the coliseum. After that it was brought out for a few home games until the nostalgia wore off, then it went away again.
If you are too young or simply don’t remember, the noise meter hung high above the coliseum floor and lit up light bulbs to signify how loud the crowd was getting. When it was full tilt, the red bulb at the top would light up and send the crowd into an even more frantic frenzy.
Now it will be used to teach young state fans about the past, and drum up nostalgia for the older ones…
“It was a priority from the beginning from the university to get (the noise meter) in, and have it functional,” said Emily Furman, an N.C. State graduate and museum exhibit designer for HealyKohler Design in Washington, D.C.
Visitors can hand-operate the noise meter, running the lights up the 10-foot tall board as crowd noise ascends through speakers throughout the museum and the voice of longtime public address announcer, C.A. Dillon, welcomes fans to Reynolds Coliseum. The mechanics to the renovated noise meter are high tech, in direct contrast to the original primitive operation. – From the News & Observer
There’s only one thing. The noise meter never really measured noise by itself. It was operated by a student manager at first and then by others later on. They would flick switches to send the lights higher when the crowd got louder.
“It was a con job from the word go,” Waters said. “We’d be warming up, and he’d have that thing one light down (from the top) and the building would be shaking. We’d tell him, ‘Give it to them, they’re going crazy out here.’ That was part of the gimmick.” – From the News & Observer
The newly renovated Reynolds opens this Friday.