1959 – It Was a Very Good Year – Onward!

I wasn’t going to do this, but I find myself too fascinated to turn away.  Fifty years is a long time, and at the speed science and society evolve, it’s an eternity.  I’m going to run down a few pertinent things…starting with this…I’ve lived to see eleven presidents in office – though admittedly I don’t remember Eisenhower too well …

Dwight D. Eisenhower

John F. Kennedy – I remember his funeral cutting into my Saturday morning cartoons.

Lyndon B. Johnson – I remember the hippies hating him.

Richard Nixon – I remember Tricky Dick, holographic campaign buttons, and Watergate.

Gerald Ford – I don’t’ remember much about Ford except the Doonesbury cartoons…

Jimmy Carter – I worked on his campaign and got drunk (first time) puking in the front yard.

Ronald Reagan – I served in the US Navy while Reagan was in office.  I shook his hand.

George H. W. Bush – I shook his hand too – on board the USS Guadalcanal.

Bill Clinton – Who can forget the blue dress?  The cigar?  The saxophone?

George W. Bush – Even he forgets.

Barack Obama – I am ever hopeful.  Whatever many of my friends say…we NEED change in the worst way before we just decay – like ancient Rome.  Onward into the next half-century of the “American Dream.”

What was going on the year I was born?

Fidel Castro took office.  The first known victim died of HIV in the Congo.  The Barbie doll was introduced.  Alaska and Hawaii became states.  America was introduced to its first “Astronauts.” Hudson and Nash joined to become American Motors (My first car was a Rambler station wagon – 1961).  The average cost of a new house was only $12,400 – less than the cost of an average car now.  Gas cost $0.25 a gallon.  Nixon argued with Khrushchev about communism.  It was the first year of the Grammy awards – Ben Hur, Sleeping Beauty and Some Like it Hot were in the movie theaters, and on the radio Doris Day, Frank Sinatra, and Connie Francis ruled the waves. On TV Bonanza premiered, and the world laughed along to the Huckleberry Hound show.  Hugh Laurie, Jason Alexander, Simon Cowell, Fred Couples – and I – were all born.  The First Boeing 707 Jet Airliner went into service, and the USSR’s Luna 2 crashed onto the moon – while Luna 3 followed with the first photos transmitted back of the moon.  It was the year of the launch of the first weather station in space, the first synthetic diamond, and the first commercial Xerox copier. Besides myself, there were inventions that year that changed the world – The Microchip – Etch a Sketch – Computer modem and the Lunar Probe to name a few.  Wow.

All of that adds up to one amazing year, and puts my own importance right into perspective.  Still, a guy who can string words into a story has his uses.  I’ve also worked with those microchips most of my adult life.  I was in the US Navy from 1977 to 1997 and most of those years I was an electronics tech.  I worked on the AN-UYK-20 computer, where commands had to be entered by pushing lighted buttons in octal-coded binary to create each command, and  you “micro-stepped” through procedures to troubleshoot.  I worked on satellite communications.  I maintained the radio in Rota, Spain, that communicated with the Space Shuttle.  I was one of the first technicians to work on Demand Access Multiplexing (The Dama system) which allowed multiple circuits to communicate on a single burst of a few micro-seconds through a satellite…I saw and did a lot, and then I found computers.

I’ve worked on everything from giant Honeywell computers with huge tape-reels for input and output to HP Superdomes.  I’ve supported literally every iteration of Dos and Windows in one form or another, and I’m now Director of IT Services for an up-and-coming multi-million dollar logistics company.  That single invention – the microchip – made all of that possible.  Not to mention that computer modem.

I have written and published about 17 novels. (Some still due).  I’ve written well over two hundred short stories.  My work has been translated into many languages.  I’ve had the privilege to be a part of the worlds of Star Trek and Stargate.  I’ve won awards, met famous people, and been president of the Horror Writer’s Association.  I can’t say everything was wonderful for fifty years, but I can say I got my share of wonderful experiences out of them…

I’m blessed with a woman who loves me, a home, pets, two daughters and three sons; my mother has her health and lives with us as well.  I can honestly say things are getting better for me all the time.  I expect the next years to be amazing.  We now have quantum physics.  Time travel and teleportation are just around the corner.  Travel to other galaxies could happen.  Is ET out there?  We could be on the verge of finding out – at the same time becoming healthier and living longer, despite our continued pursuit of bad habits.  It’s a cool time to be alive.  I want to thank each and every one of you reading this for taking the time – for caring enough to share the moment – and for being part of all of it.

Here’s to the other side of the mountain.

-DNW