I entered John Burroughs with the class of 1955 in September 1952. In April 1954 I left Burroughs to travel to India with my family. I was required to cut short a promising year in Varsity Track, missing the CIF meets. My Father was assigned to set up the maintenance facility in Bombay, India for Air India International to support the new Lockheed Super Constellation passenger liners.

While in India I traveled all over the country with my family, and also with Indian friends on motorcycle trips. I learned to fly, got my pilot's license and flew Tiger Moths, Sopwiths, Pipers, and Bonanzas. With a friend of the family, Joe Kozarek, who had his own airline for cargo and trips to the Haj at Mecca, I also flew twin Beeches and Douglas C47/DC3's. I continued my studies in math, science, literature, and drafting with the International Correspondence School in London and a private academy in Darjeeling, Kashmir. I, unfortunately, learned little Hindi or Gujerati.

My family returned to Burbank in April 1955 in time for me to finish my junior year at Burroughs. I graduated with the summer class of 1956 with an NROTC scholarship, which I declined. Instead, I attended Pierce College to participate in football and track with some friends of mine. During this time, I re-established my earlier relationship with Karen Fairfield. We became engaged, but, due to the separation of distance and probably disparities in some of life's priorities, Karen married a classmate from San Jose State.

I left college and took a series of jobs, living in Hollywood with friends until November 1957 when I joined my family in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil to relax and "contemplate my navel". I taught English as a foreign language to students with the Instuto Brasil/Estados Unidos and to engineers for the Brazilian government. (I have been fluent in Portuguese since living in Brazil as a child). This provided living expenses and supported my new avocation of sailing.

I returned to Burbank in 1959 and took a job at General Controls on Allen Avenue as a design draftsmen. I worked there until 1964 when I entered the University of Dayton with a job as a technical representative for General Controls at Wright Patterson AFB.

I had married in 1960 and had a daughter in 1963. My oldest son was born while at UD. I graduated in 1967 with a degree in electrical engineering (Magna cum Laude).

I returned to Southern California and was employed by an old boss at Consolidated Controls Corp. in El Segundo. I continued school to get a Masters Degree in Systems Engineering Management (Summa Cum Laude). I was with CCC for 20 years as a project engineer, project manager, product manager, until the Challenger incident changed the culture of creativity in aerospace. I left the corporate world and started my own business in 1986.

My academic and professional associations included Tau Beta Pi, IEEE, American Defense Preparedness Association, and the American Society of Professional Engineers. I am a Registered Professional Control Systems Engineer in California

I have greatly enjoyed my independent years, (I was divorced in 1981), and have conducted my engineering business here in the USA and Brazil providing designs for manufacturing and test equipment. I am currently semi-retired, but still service some old customers and selected new accounts.

My mother is living in Florida and my sister, a teacher, lives near her. I have three children, a daughter, 39, with four children living in California, a son, 37, with two sons, and an unmarried son, 33, both living in Atlanta.

Etc., etc., etc. And now for something completely different!

During what began as an uneventful day in March 2002, researching machinery for a project on the Internet, a banner ad for Classmates.com appeared on my screen. I answered the add and logged with the Burroughs class of 1955. The next morning a message from Carolyn Muscorella was waiting for me stating that Karen Fairfield had been inquiring about me.

Karen was in the process of a divorce, I was evaluating my life options at 65, and now we are engaged to be married sometime next year.