Hi there, if you've made it this far, undoubtably you know who I am, and undoubtably you must be bored, so I'll fill you in a little bit on who I am and how I came to be here.. I was born in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. My father was in the United States Air Force and we were stationed at Altus Air Force Base. Soon thereafter we moved first to France, then Holland and then to Charleston AFB in South Carolina. I attended first and second grade at St. John's Catholic School in Charleston.

In1972, my dad received orders to serve in Vietnam and my mom, sister and myself went to live with my grandmother in Liverpool, England. My mom's side of the family is from Liverpool, so this was a great opportunity to get to know my aunts, uncles and cousins over there. It was there that I became, and remain today, a staunch supporter of the greatest football (soccer) team in the world.. Liverpool F.C. We lived in Liverpool for a little over a year and when my dad's tour of duty was complete, he was stationed at Mildenhall AFB in the south eastern portion of England. I attended St. Louis Catholic School in Bury St. Edmunds through the United States equivalent of the Seventh Grade.

I really enjoyed my time living in England and could easily call it home.. It's a wonderful country and has a lot to offer.. I'm an Electrical Engineer today and honestly feel I owe the start of that to the strong math and science curriculum I was exposed to in England. Upon my return to the United States and entering the Eighth Grade, I found myself at least one/two years ahead in math.. but for the life of me.. had no idea how to "diagram" a sentance. I'll take that trade any day of the week.. I made it through 8th grade English.. diagramming sentances with predicate nominatives and whatever other crap they thought up is time better spent in my opinion learning how to perform a task that you might actually have to accomplish after leaving school :). Anyway, I digress.. August 1st, 1977 saw us leave England and return to the United States. Next port of call... MacDill AFB, Tampa Florida.

I entered 8th Grade at St. Patrick's Catholic School in Tampa in the fall of 1977 and started High School in 1978 at Jesuit High School. What England did for me in jump starting my interest and ability in the Math/Science fields, Jesuit High School completed! I cannot emphasize enough the value of a strong background and early start in the technical fields prior to starting University.. I watched many intelligent fellow classmates get overwhelmed at College from a lack of preparation.. due mostly to the inability to apply and discipline themselves than anything else.

While living in Tampa, I also became a staunch Tampa Bay Buccaneer fan and remain one today! I started out supporting them in the rough days. My first year in Tampa saw the team continue their 0-14 inaugrial season with an 0-12 start in 1978. They finally beat New Orleans in an away game to go 1-12 and I was present at Tampa Stadium to watch them win their first ever home game against the St. Louis Cardinals in week 14 to finish the season 2-12. My parents bought me season tickets after that allowing me to goto almost every Buc home game through 1982.

In 1981, my dad retired from Air Force active duty and accepted a position with the Government Service and accepted a club management position in first Dayton, OH (Wright Patterson AFB) and then Tyndall AFB in Panama City, FL.. Thankfully, however, he allowed me to finish Jesuit HS prior to leaving Tampa. In 1982, I graduated from Jesuit and moved with the family to Warner Robins, GA.

Fall of 1982 saw me enter Georgia Tech and start my quest for an Electrical Engineering degree. I've looked back from time to time and asked myself why I chose engineering as a field of study and more specifically, why electrical... I'm not sure about the answer to that question, at least not the electrical part of it.. I think it was due to the mystique about learning and understanding something that most folk's eyes glaze over just hearing the initial details ;). I graduated from Georgia Tech in 1986 with a degree in Electrical Engineering and chose Power Engineering as my speciality.

I accepted an engineering position with Westinghouse Electric Co. and started my power generation career in the fall of 1986. Life was good for a while but I soon found myself lacking challenge. Guys around me (twenty years my senior) were doing things I wanted to do, and the beurocracy set up made it clear that things were just fine as they were and all I needed to do was keep things headed on an even and steady keel.. That was all well and good for a while, but I soon became restless and finally took a risk in 1991 and joined a newly formed Westinghouse Division called The Magnet Systems Division (WMSD). We were formed to support a contract Westinghouse had received to support the design and manufacture of the Super-Conductive magnets for the Super-Conducting Super Collider (SSC).

My experience with the SSC has formed both the best and worse times of my life and will be a chapter I'll never forget. I realize that this page is becoming drawn out, but it frickin amazes me and did at the time as to how the SSC was cancelled. I'm a "good" American and love my country more than anyone reading this will understand, but the experience I lived regarding the SSC will sicken me 'till the day I die! We had closed circuit TV's at work and watched the house/senate hearings/debates regarding the Project during our demise. Talk about un-informed debates.. or rather bullsh@t arguements.. For some un-known reason, the SSC was labeled as a line item budget item on the water budget (don't quote me on this.. it was a line item on some major budget that was as about irrevelant as you could imagine!!). But, because it was a line item, it had to be voted on for continuation of funds, etc.. The yearly budget for the SSC was about $800M a year.. less than about 20 minutes of one day of the Education Budget... and yet we had idiotic politicians (actually, they were smart... we were dumb!!) standing up stating that they were saving our National budget by killing the SSC. Truth known, it meant nothing.. it was an opportunity for some Washington based ass%^es to stand up and claim that they were saving and reducing the deficit. If you think that maybe I am biased.. you'd be right! This was a project that would be yielding positive contributions to society today.. we met every single technical goal and requirement.. it was our polititians that failed us.. Bill Clinton maybe.. could be.. lol .... Asshole!

From Texas I moved to Ft. Payne, Alabama in 1993 and took an engineering position at a Westinghouse Power Generation manufacturing facility located there.

'97 saw me move to Allentown, Pennsylvania and accept a position with Everson Electric.. a company that looked a whole lot better from the outside/in than it did from the inside... In 1998, I moved to Pittsburgh and accepted an Engineering position at Keystone Power Group and worked in the Ex-Westinghouse Facility that I started at when Westinghouse was still the owner/occupant of the facility (spent several months there in training back in 1986).

In February 2003, I accepted a Design Engineering position with National Electric Coil in Columbus, Ohio. NEC works in Power Generation and designs equipment for Power Plant electric generators/excitation units. I honestly believed this would be my last career move, not just because I didn't want to update this page again, but because I enjoyed the challenges and the opportunities to work with the large electrical generators.

Alas, 2007 saw me move again. Ironically it was a move that took me full circle and back to my roots; June 2007 saw me rejoin Westinghouse and take an electrical engineering position with the Nuclear Services Division in Madison, PA. Nuclear Power generation is making a comeback and I happily made the decision to be a part of that effort. At Westinghouse, we are calling it the Nuclear Renaissance, and all indicators point to a bright future for us and the Nuclear Power Industry.

So, there you have it.. it's late 2007 as I write this and I'm very happy with my current situiation. I live in North Huntingdon, PA, bought a house a few months back and have a couple of dogs - Shep and Spud, couple of cats - Bucca and PeeWee and lastly, Karen, my wife .

Take care..

Tony (aka.. Tones)