The door that nobody else will go in at, seems always to swing open widely for me. Clara Barton, nurse, educator, American Red Cross founder

Thursday, September 18, 1980 appeared to be just another ordinary day in Southern California, with bright sunshine washing over San Pedro. For my wife, Melody, and me, it was packing day, as we were to about to embark on our long awaited vacation across the United States. As newlyweds, married in May the year prior, we had an itch to see the country by road. As I young engineer at Logicon, an aerospace company in San Pedro, I had been saving up precious vacation days for the trip. We were set to pack into our tiny Renault Le Car and drive east along Interstate 10 and up the Atlantic coast to experience the autumn foliage in New England. That morning, I boarded the elevator to go up to my office on the ninth floor and ran into Gordon Small, a manager I had worked with on another project. He asked what project I was working on. “Well, I’m finishing up my testing work on the software for a satellite remote sensing system.” He listened, then asked, “Would you consider working on GPS? We have two openings. One in San Pedro, and the other in Gaithersburg, Maryland, next to Washington DC.” This was a system I had heard about, and had early decided if I could get on this program, I would. “You bet, Gordon. I’m very interested. But there is a problem. Melody and I are leaving town at 4:00 tomorrow morning on a 30-day trip across country. But we are passing through Washington. How about we check it out when we go through, and I’ll let you know which location when I get back.” We arrived at our floor, and with just 30 seconds of conversation, at the right place and the right time, I had set in motion a career which would guide my life for the next 40 years.

Along this path of GPS, I learned many career lessons as well as life lessons. This book shares with you the fascinating and amazing story of my role on this remarkable system, as well as lessons I learned along the way.