Catapult From TV Show to Send Old Computers to Skies
A giant catapult that hurled a 450-pound piano on the TV show “Northern Exposure” is in commission once again: It will fling old personal computers at a summer festival.
Organizers of Da Vinci Days, which celebrates the future in arts, science and technology, paid $2,000 for the big machine, which can hurl items as far as 100 yards. The event is scheduled for July 19-21 in Corvallis, home of a Hewlett-Packard complex.
Why old computers? No one seems to want to get rid of them, said Steve Remington, festival director. “It was kind of symbolic of our triumph over technology. We refuse to be shackled by them. We want to continue to evolve upward.”
CBS had the catapult built for “Northern Exposure,” the offbeat show set in the fictional town of Cicely, Alaska. The show was canceled last year after a five-year run.
The catapult is 30 feet tall and has a 40-foot beam. The base is made of a dozen fir logs bolted and strapped together with steel.
The builder, John Wayne Cyra, has stored the catapult in a barn in Monroe, Wash.
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