Bus Stop

The first CATUG meeting I attended was in November of 1988 at the invitation of Butch Weinberg. At that time Steve Cooper was the meeting coordinator seeing to it that there was always a room available to us at the Downers Grove Public Library. In April of 1989 Steve invited us to his home near by so that I might demonstrate the new club BBS which at that time was running оп а PDP 11/60 located in Schaumburg, Illinois. Steve decided at that meeting that providing his home for club meetings was easier than setting up once a month at the library and the new location of the CATUG clubhouse with the Dutch front door was born.

Steve Cooper became our Vice President in January of 1991. His favorite machine was the TS2068 with a John Oliger Disk Drive interface attached. To this he had connected two 5.25″ 80 track disk drives. Steve preferred NMI saves over running the programs as they would have run from tape. A RAINBOW interface plugged into the rear of the Oliger interface provided Steve with a Spectrum ROM and a Kempston Joystick input. The Oliger printer interface given to him by Jay Shepard of Boxholm, IOWA, provided Steve with the interface needed to drive his MEMOTECH full sized printer. Also connected to his system was a trusty WESTRIDGE 2050 modem, however, he kept it around for our use rather than his own use. A G.E. data recorder proved to be the most reliable tape machine for his system even though he also had a TS2020 tape machine. The Video was provided by an AMDEK Color Monitor. All this was contained in а bookcase arrangement with manuals and disks in easy reach.

On the opposite side of the room was a desk with a second TS2068 set-up which used an Apple Color Monitor. This machine allowed a young neighbor boy to come over and try out a couple of plug-in game cartridges from time to time. It also was the unit we used to plug in a visiting LarKen Disk System or peripheral requiring repair.

On the dinning room table Steve kept a wooden cabinet which contained a QL setup he only seemed to have open when the club meeting day arrived.

Because of the more relaxed meeting place this new club house provided, meetings would run from 1 PM to almost 6 PM. Steve often provided a light dinner of hamburgers or hot dogs and other goodies. Steve also had the best 7152068 software collection of us all and was often showing us software titles none of us had ever seen before. All this neat stuff at one location and Steve’s wonderful hospitality made his home a great place to meet and call ‘Our Clubhouse’.

On December 23, 1995 the Dutch door of the old club house closed for the final time when Vice President Steve Cooper left us to be with the LORD. Steve will be remembered and loved long into the next century by the friends he opened his home to for all those years.