When Don Schoenbeck, project manager at NITCO, began his position in January of 1985, the industry—and the world—looked a lot different. He started when NITCO was known as just the local telephone company. When a former colleague from his previous company, Multimedia Cablevision, asked Schoenbeck to come work for him at NITCO, he took the opportunity.
“I came in, met the owner, and I didn’t even fill out an application,” Schoenbeck said. “They hired me there. For two years, I commuted 60 miles to work, since I was living in Oak Forest, Ill. at the time.”
When he started his career at NITCO, his job involved mapping and permitting new cable lines. With an architecture degree under his belt, Schoenbeck had plenty of experience and expertise in planning that he brought to NITCO. But while he still works to design and permit new networks, the past 36 years has seen a drastic change in the industry and how people use NITCO’s services every day.
“The biggest change, of course, has been the fact that the internet and fiber optics have taken over what we did before—I don’t even know what we would consider a precursor to the internet,” Schoenbeck said. “Lines used to be all copper. We still use a lot of copper lines because of how useful they are. They still transmit wonderful signal quality for DSL and for digital telephone services. The only problem is you’ve got distance limitations with copper lines.”
“With fiber, you don’t have limitations,” he continued. “The bandwidth is exponentially bigger. If you go with fiber, you can go to speeds that are unheard of compared to what we had back when I started.”
Schoenbeck reflected on how quickly the industry seemed to change, remarking how the needs in a home have changed within the past 10 years.
“There was never really a need or a want for super speeds like a gigabyte 10 years ago,” he said. “Now, it’s essential. It’s crazy to think how fast these speeds are now, how this has become an industry standard. You think back to 10 years ago; what did you have in your house then versus what you have now? I mean, your refrigerator can have WI-FI! Doorbells, pet feeders, TVs, you name it. It can be 20 different items in your home that require WI-FI now.”
Amidst the COVID-19 pandemic, NITCO saw an increased need for high-speed internet. Schoenbeck and his crew have been out every day ensuring those speeds are consistent and are working for customers as they continue to work and learn from home.
“I’ve been in almost every day with the construction, installation, and repair crews right beside me,” he said. “We have to be out here every day. But while we had more work than we ever had, since more people were home, we were able to get a lot done and have continued to be really efficient. A lot of the daily interruptions don’t come about as much, so we are able to stay on task instead of getting pulled off a task to go fix a problem in the field. It has been a tough year, no doubt about that, but we have really been able to stay focused and do our work quickly and efficiently to keep service up and running.”
Schoenbeck grew up in Oak Forest and lived there until he moved to Northwest Indiana with his wife in late 1986. He and his wife have been married for 35 years, and together, they coach softball.
“My wife was a college coach for a while, and she still coaches the Wheeler High School softball team,” Schoenbeck said. “I coached for 38 years and recently retired from that so I can enjoy the summer!”
Schoenbeck is also a part of a bowling league, a pastime he has enjoyed for over 50 years.
“Bowling has been a lifelong passion of mine, ever since I was 16,” he said.
A more recent passion of Schoenbeck’s, however, is restoring old pinball machines. While it’s a time-consuming project and he doesn’t get as much time to work on them as he used to, Schoenbeck has done work on vintage machines he is really proud of.
“I have a couple that I’m really proud of, like this old Ted Nugent machine,” he said. “Whenever I’m able to, I will get a new machine that doesn’t work anymore, strip it down all the way to the wood, and completely customize it.”
For more information about NITCO, visit its website at https://www.nitco.com/.
