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After graduation I attended Gonzaga University in Spokane, WA for a year with my brother Ed. I returned to Japan for the summer of 1965 as my Dad was retiring and it would be my last chance to visit. My folks retired to Southern California and I attended Long Beach State until I was drafted in February of 1969.
Basic Training and A.I.T. were at Fort Ord, CA and then on to Artillery OCS at Fort Sill, OK. Commissioned in January of 1970 as a Signal Corps 2LT, I went to Fort Gordon, GA for Officer Basic and then to Fort Benning, GA for Airborne School. I was assigned to the 82nd Airborne Division and spent the next 17 month as a Communications Platoon Leader until I separated in October 1971.
As many of you may remember, I got hooked on skiing while in Japan and since I hadn’t skied in 3 years I decided to take a winter “off’ and got a job as a Lift Operator at Squaw Valley, CA for the season. This turned out to be a career move as 43 years later I still work in the Ski Industry! I worked a variety of jobs at Squaw including 3 years on the Professional Ski Patrol. In 1976 I was given an opportunity to move to Colorado to install ski lifts for the summer and decided to move and try to find employment in Colorado year around. I got a winter seasonal job working at Copper Mountain, CO as a groomer which fit well with my summer seasonal job installation lifts. I travelled all over the U.S. and Canada installing lifts which was hard work but fit well with the wanderlust lifestyle we all had in our youth. And as I often told people, I was getting paid to go hiking (often with a shovel over my shoulder) and have a picnic lunch (out of my lunch box) in the mountains every day!
In May 1982 I got married and decided that life on the road wasn’t going to work anymore so I took a full time position at Copper Mountain as the Lift Construction Supervisor (summer) and Grooming Foreman (winter). In October 1983 my son Blake was born and life was going well until August of 1988 when my wife was diagnosed with Kidney Cancer. She passed away a year later. I raised Blake on my own until 1994 when I met my present wife.
Anita was recently divorced and had 2 boys, Luke and Matthew. Luke is 6 weeks older that Blake and Matthew is 2 years younger. We were married in August of 1994 and survived all the trials and tribulations that come with trying to blend 2 families together. 20 years later we are still together and all the boys are healthy and happy!
In 1998 I was getting stagnant working at Copper and had an opportunity to go to work for a new ski lift company that was joining the U.S. market. Leitner, and established lift company in Italy, was starting a North American branch and I signed on as their Project Manager for installations. Due to our size, I also became the Assistant Sales Manager which entailed extensive travel all over the U.S. and also to our HQ in Italy. In 2000 the lift market in the U.S. was saturated with 4 manufacturers. Leitner bought out POMA, a French lift manufacturer, and as Poma of America was well established the company became Leitner-Poma of America manufacturing and selling the product designed in Grand Junction, CO. I became the Parts & Service Manager for the Leitner lifts that had been installed in North America and continue that job today from a home office in Broomfield, CO. Anita has worked for Vail Resorts for 30 years and is currently Vice President of Procurement at their Broomfield HQ.
I try to be semi-retired and only work 4 days a week so I can ski in the winter and play golf in the summer but I need to work harder at just picking a day and leaving the office. Maybe my one year old granddaughter will help with that in the future!
Cheers-
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