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the local culture. At Tulane MedicalSchool, I learned to do microsurgery ina frog’s ear (my first real experiencewith anatomy) and recorded nervepulses from the eighth (hearing) nerve.I also developed a new undergraduatecourse in psychology called ‘SensoryWorld of Animals’ at Tulane University.As microcomputers were justemerging, I developed some neurophysiologicalsoftware tools with colleaguesand even started a businesswith my wife to meet the need foraffordable computer supplies. Thatentrepreneurial experience continuesto be valuable.When a former colleague invitedme to join his research group at theIllinois Natural History Survey, I hadthe thrill of working with emergingDoppler weather radar (NEXRAD)systems to detect birds and warn aircraftof threats aloft. While bird strikeswere a significant and expensive problemthen, the work was underappreciatedat the time. But 21 years later,when US Airways Flight 1549 had tomake an emergency landing on theyears later, I was offered a job at MartinMarietta, which was diversifyinginto postal automation. As a scientist,problem solver, and software manager,I was privileged to participate in theemerging delivery point automationprogram for mail that would result inhuge time and cost savings comparedwith manual sorting.Later, I moved to Pitney Bowes tobecome program manager of the postalbarcode sorter business. Within a fewyears, I was named the first-ever“product guru” for digital documentdelivery, including electronic bill presentmentand payment. This positionlaunched me on a intensive inventioneffort which has resulted in 32 issuedton Quine ’65patents for improvements in suchDoug ‘at work’ in personal protective equipment.Hudson River after colliding with aflock, bird strikes —the aviation termfor birds hitting a windshield of aplane or getting sucked into an enginefan—are now a common topic of conversation.It was gratifying that ourearly work laid the foundation forsome solutions being implementedtoday.As a lifelong stamp collector (Ibought my Scott International StampAlbum for 30 cents at a Park Schooltag sale), I recall the moment in 1982that a brief article in Linn’s StampNews about postal barcodes onenvelopes captured my imagination. Idiscovered envelopes with handwrittenaddresses had a very high error rate.When I reverse-engineered the failurepatterns, I realized that when thepostal optical character readers failedto read illegible addresses, theysearched further afield and sometimesencoded the return address, whichdirected the envelope back to thesender. My volunteer research won anumber of awards in the philatelic(stamp collecting) community. SixHigh school photograph on a valid personalizedpostage stamp that Doug helped develop.diverse fields as environmentally sensitiveexpiration dates (i.e. ice cream), e-mail address correction, multimediabusiness-to-employee communications,paperless checks, and voting by mail.After the anthrax letters disrupted mailservice in 2001, I was called upon formy scientific and problem-solvingskills to help develop a portableanthrax detection system. That effortled to three issued patents, having theDepartment of Homeland Security designatethe system as a “Qualified Anti-Terrorism Technology,” and myproviding mailroom security solutionsfor seven years.It is now time to begin planningCareer 9.0—my next big project.Throughout my life’s journey, I’ve beendiscovering that the value of educationis to prepare one to discover newthings, to solve problems, and tobecome a continuous learner.The Park Bulletin | Fall 2010 25