True story ...
In the mid-1990s, I lived in the Davidson Dorms, the ones that were like single story converted army barracks (I have no idea if they are still there or not). Whatever they were made of (steel?) did not allow for television reception through an antenna. All you got was static. And this was before the dorms got cable TV. So I tied about 30 feet of speaker wire to the antenna-connection on the back of the TV, snaked it out the window, and then I tied it to a branch at the top of the tallest tree right outside the window. So we were the only room in the doom that could get crystal-clear CBS, NBC and ABC - it meant we could watch Letterman, Saturday Night Live and Monday Night Football - which was a minor miracle. Each channel meant you had to slightly pull on the wire (and move the branch) to get reception and sometimes someone had to hold the wire the entire show or it would get static ... but it was the best we could do.
Once every two weeks or so, the fire department would come by and cut our wire and post a note on our door threatening to fine us, but they never did. I'd just climb back up the tree with new wire the next day.
As an aside, we had a TV in the lounge/common area of the dorm, too. But this one could only get PBS. Which meant at 3 PM every day you had fifteen 18 year old guys piled in the dorm lounge watching the Muppet Show because they were so deprived of TV they'd watch anything.