I was hired at NEC not into the application programming group as I had hoped, but as the second person in the systems engineering group. Initially I became an expert on NEC’s Astra minicomputers, and as the industry evolved so did my work — moving through engineering workstations, personal computers, servers, desktops, and notebooks over the years.

When I arrived the president of NEC Information Systems was Dick Underwood, whom NEC had brought in from Honeywell. About a week after I started he came around to get to know the new people, resume in hand. One of his questions was about the 5-year gap on my resume — the gas station years. As soon as I explained it he got up and left without a word. He did not like the answer.

After several months I had become his best troubleshooter for any major technical problem the company encountered. He never mentioned the gas station again.

One time a newly hired programmer asked me what advanced degree I had and from which university. I told him I did not have one, and that the logic I used to analyze and fix computer problems was something I had learned fixing cars — because diagnosing a car required exactly the same disciplined thinking. He did not quite know what to say to that.

It was a long and challenging career and there is more to tell about it, but the full NEC story deserves its own time.