The nights of darkened end zones and squinted eyes amongst the fans at Carson High football games are now over. On Friday, Ron Pacheco, President of the Carson City booster club and members of the Sierra Pacific Power Co. took down the field's aging old lights and replaced them with a set of newer and brighter lights.
"The old lights were just terrible,"said Pacheco, who raised money for the lights through several fund raisers, including the up-coming inaugural Carson High Football Hall of Fame induction dinner.
However, tonight and Tuesday, Pacheco and the Sierra Pacific Power Co. will run several tests on the lights.
"We're just going to make sure the lights actually work," Pacheco said.
The lights cost $22,000, with the CC booster club raising half of the amount, and Carson High School donating the other half, according to Pacheco.
The lights were scheduled to go up last year but Pacheco said the club missed their chance.
"The reason we couldn't do it last year was because there was only a certain time to do it before the season starts," Pacheco said. "We missed that small window of opportunity last year, but we made sure they went up this year."
Sierra Pacific Power Co. workers' Al Teixeira and Bill Keating helped Pacheco with putting up the lights Friday afternoon but there was only one problem. They needed a crane.
In came Kelly Connelly, who donated his time and more importantly, a crane to set up the lights. Without all of their help, Pacheco said it would've been a harder project to accomplish.
"Kelly, Al, and Bill were great," Pacheco said. "Each of them donated their time, with Al and Bill giving almost 16 hours."
Besides the Hall of Fame dinner, Pacheco said the booster club held three other events to raise money, such as a dinner, which also featured a dance and auction held at Odell's restaurant.
"That was a good one because we had an autographed 49ers helmet and a Jerry Rice signature,"Pacheco said.
The other two ways they generated funds were from the club's annual car wash and selling ads to local businesses for space in the 2000 Carson High School football program.
The old lights are still usable and will most likely be moved to either the soccer field or softball field, Pacheco said.