I was born in the coal mining town of Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania in 1942. My family included two brothers. The three of us all became Eagle Scouts. When planning for college, I was fortunate to receive a nomination to attend the United States Merchant Marine Academy located in Kings Point, New York. The Merchant Marine Academy was founded in the 1930’s to train young men as ship officers. I graduated from Kings Point in the summer of 1964 and joined my first ship shortly afterwards. This ship, named Cableship Long Lines, was owned by AT&T for laying telephone cable in the Atlantic, Pacific, and the Caribbean. When not laying cable, our ship was stationed in Honolulu. It was there that I met and married my wife, Penny 52 years ago. I continued to serve on the Long Lines for 11 years reaching the position of Chief Engineer. After a few years, AT&T changed management which changed my job. Penny and I decided to move to the Bay Area where Penny’s family lived. Soon after the move, I was hired by a high-tech company (Varian Associates) as Director of Facilities, a position I held for 25 years.
We have 4 children and 11 grandchildren. We moved to San Luis Obispo two years ago to be closer to our daughter and family. My interests are traveling, home improvement, spending time with family and watching Giants Baseball games.