Wordless (nearly) Wednesday - Easter 45 Years Ago

Wordless (nearly) Wednesday - Easter 45 Years Ago

As I've noted earlier, I'm working my way through scanning our family slides, systematically, for 1976 or so back in time to 1952... today was Easter, 45 years ago, with our first two daughters!

[This was in Schenectady, New York, when I was working for General Electric.]

 Above, they got some Easter candy in their baskets. Below, they are dressed up in their finest for Church - even white gloves! Oh, my!  ;-)

Families are Forever!  ;-)

For sure! ;-)

Sharing Memories Sunday - On to West Branch, Iowa, from Schenectady, NY

Sharing Memories Sunday
On to West Branch, Iowa, from Schenectady, NY


On Those Places Thursday this past week, I began to talk about moving to West Branch, Iowa. To do this, of course, I left General Electric as we discussed a bit earlier (my goodness, that was back in March, how time flies!).

The details are relatively unimportant, at this point, but a Dr. Stuelke, a physician based in West Branch (he also had a medical practice office in Iowa City) owned two nursing homes and a hardware store and some real estate in addition to his medical practices. He was an entrepreneur - Stuelke Enterprises was my employer. His financial advisor with Peat, Marwick (out of Cedar Rapids - the same national CPA firm I was working with at GE) had recommended for some time that he hire a Business Manager. His accounting records were falling behind, and, Medicare rules and regulations were just coming into existence that would be having a major impact on his business plans, the advisor told him (as I recall).

Anyway, his needs appeared to fit my desires to return to the mid-west, and we had a baby on the way. We got moved to Iowa and into the little rental house, mentioned on Thursday, while Nancy was still able to travel (that is a story for another day, by her!). Upon arrival, I put on my 'green eye shade' and got to work setting up a decent set of accounting records, by department, that he would need in order to understand where he stood with his business interests (using my GE learned accounting procedures). Quite a different environment and scale of operations, but I was very pleased to have the opportunity and I was really enjoying what I was doing.

[I didn't really wear a 'green-eye-shade' but the concentration was the same - neat image!]

Being back in Iowa was nice, too, of course, being much closer (at least in the same state) with both of our families. We settled in, of course, with the girls in school.


Families are Forever!  ;-)

Those Places - GE in Schenectady

Those Places -  GE in Schenectady

I'm going to need to move on from "my memories" from Schenectady. I wanted to do one more piece to finish my time on the GE Corporate Traveling Auditors staff, but I cannot find my "prop."

I have an 8x10 piece of paper that is full of small photos. It is the structure of the audit staff and head shots of all the men (no women, of course, in 1968) on it that quarter. It was updated, quarterly, at least. It was something like 10 rows wide and 14 rows high with the 4 highest ranking (longest there) in a top row (Larry Bossidy, as I mentioned earlier, was No. 1, at that time). When you first arrive, your face appears at the lower right. As your tenure grows, you move along the bottom row, then start at the right again on the second row from the bottom.

I was up to about the third or fourth row (from the bottom) when I decided to "move on." Guys were always "moving on" of course, for various reasons. My reason was, as mentioned a while back, I came to realize I could not see myself doing what the guys going "up and off" were going to do in terms of job and location, within the Company. Also, to get high enough to get really good jobs, meant continuing this traveling life for several years. I decided: "I was married to my wife and children, not to the company." That is my story, and I'm sticking to it!  ;-)

I loved GE. I loved what they stood for. I still do. During the Arnold Palmer Invitational golf tournament last weekend, GE was a major sponsor. I always stopped and admired their commercials. I cannot help it. But, that life was not for me. So, we moved on.

Story to be continued.


Families are Forever!  ;-)

Sharing Memories - GE Traveling Auditor - Schenectady

Sharing Memories - GE Traveling Auditor - Schenectady

As I have said many times over the years, "I got a solid ten years of powerful business experience in that 'little over a year' on the GE Traveling Auditor staff." True or not, it certainly felt like it. Of course, my family and I were dealing with some serious family issues during this period, as well, as I discussed last Sunday.

Once I got through the 'orientation' process, in town, the 'normal' process was a three-month audit in a distant location with only a week-end at home each month end. We tended to work ten-twelve hour days, on the road at a GE facility. We not only did the financial audit, under the auspices of Peat, Marwick, Mitchell, & Co (as the CPA firm was known at that time), the official GE auditors, but we did a full operational audit of the operations under review, as well. So, not only did we learn the accounting procedures, we learned the entire operations of each unit. It was a fantastic, incomparable opportunity to learn 'best practice' business operations - or not, if it was not a great unit, of course [of course, there were NONE of those at GE! ;-) Silly me to even suggest...].

I want to briefly mention two people that, to me, represent both the quality and the depth of the experience. Reginald Jones, a future GE CEO, was on the corporate audit staff for eight years; as CEO, he was the one who selected Jack Welch to succeed him. Here is his Wikipedia link; the link on his name is to the GE write-up. He was the Financial V-P to whom the Traveling Auditors reported, during the time I was there. I never met him. Note on GE bio - he started in the same BTC program I did, but he started in the year I was born!  ;-)

OK, three guys… Gerald L. Phillippe was the CEO at the time I was with GE. It was his son-in-law who was in my program, a friend and colleague, in Louisville. Phillippe was born in Ute, Iowa… not even a stop-light in the town, perhaps.

The most directly influential on me, and I not only met him, I had a three month audit directly under his supervision as a junior member of his team: Lawrence A. ("Larry") Bossidy. He is generally credited with founding, and he did serve as Chief Operation Officer of, General Electric Credit Corporation; a major contributor to the success of Jack Welch as GE CEO. Bossidy later served as CEO of Allied Signal/Honeywell.

I have often described my impression of Larry, from my first hand experience: "He was the singularly most devoted person to his work assignment of any person I have ever known." Larry was one of our four 'top leaders' on the GE Traveling Auditor Staff, while I was there. Much like Jones was his last 4-5 years, I assume. Bossidy ran the audit in Phoenix, Arizona, at that time, the GE Computer Division - it was later sold off. This was Apr-May-Jun of 1968. 

A few days after returning from the end of May home visit, the team had gone to the 'new' movie, 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), as I recall. When I came out, I got in a phone booth, and called Nancy saying I had decided it was going to be time to 'move on' when I could arrange for a new job. Besides the rigors of the traveling, it was becoming obvious, that even if I stayed on, and was successful, the job I would be earning the opportunity to be considered for in GE would be in a GE plant on the east coast. That was simply not what I saw as a future we wanted to have.

To be continued…

Families are Forever!  ;-)

Sharing Memories Sunday - Appril Eileen Smith

Sharing Memories Sunday - Appril Eileen Smith

The primary memory of our first six months in Schenectady, as I was struggling to learn this new, high level, Traveling Auditor game, was on the home front. Nancy was pregnant with our third child, due in 1968 (first one, 1960; second, 1964). Unfortunately, she was a Rh Factor baby. She decided to come early, on December 23, 1967. However, her little heart was not up to the strain her 'conflicted' body put on her. All the remedies easily available today had not yet been developed by medical science at that time.

Appril Eileen Smith died on Christmas morning, December 25, 1967.

We buried her in Schenectady, where she was born. However, a few years later, when it was apparent we would never live there, again, we brought her little casket back to Iowa, with the metal marker, to the Union Township cemetery near Coon Rapids, near where my Dad was buried. When Mom died, in 1999, we decided to buy our own gravestone, for future use, near theirs, and mounted the metal marker on the back of our stone (rather than have the grass grow over it).

Families are Forever!  ;-)

Those Places Thursday - Schenectady, New York home

Those Places Thursday - Schenectady, New York home

As mentioned in Shared Memories, last Sunday, our next stop was Schenectady, New York, at the time the headquarters of the GE Traveling Auditors of which I was becoming a part.

We were fortunate to find a nice split-level home that served us well through the coming, often difficult, year. Annette has many memories of walking to school and playing with friends in the neighborhood. Allison wanted to go everywhere, too, but we needed to be careful - she was still very young. I spent a lot of time on the road, of course. And, did I mention, Nancy was very pregnant… More on Sunday, in our next Sharing Memories.

Just remember how to find this one of my Mom, Eileen, in front of the house, Mar 1969:

The girls shared a big bed room over the garage!


Families are Forever!  ;-)

Sharing Memories on Sunday - GE and Louisville

Sharing Memories on Sunday - GE and Louisville

Picking up from the last Those Places Thursday, I will try to share some general memories of my experience in the new job at GE in Louisville. They generally all in three categories: 1) actual GE work experience, 2) continuing my education outside of work, and 3) home and family life.

As I mentioned to Allison and Annette (when she was here last weekend), this is the point in my life where 'real life' began, and with it, many things in my memory 'clump' together. It becomes very difficult to connect specific memories with particular times. For this reason, among others, I just pulled out a copy of a resume I wrote while in the Iowa Governor's Office a few years later, to write down some dates for reference: GE Louisville - Aug 64 to Aug 67; GE Traveling Auditor - Aug 67 to Sep 68; Business Manager, SE - Oct 68 to Oct 69; Management Consultant, PMM - Nov 69 to May 70.

As I mentioned at the end of last Sunday's post, work was a real challenge, but I loved it. Whereas my work in the Air Force was mostly becoming accustomed to the organizational issues, my work at GE was certainly that but also a lot more in terms of learning content as I carried out my assignments. I wrote in the resume referred to earlier: "Rotational work assignments in all areas of finance in Consolidated Accounting Operations of Appliance Park. Financial Analyst for Relations and Utilities Operations." I know I was also involved in the Financial Management Program (FMP - which had been BTC) program activities as well during this three years. The group of us in the program would have meetings, speakers from around the country, and some sort of ongoing evaluations - but I honestly do not remember these, at all. I do know we were being trained to be a pool of talent from which to choose those who were on a fast track to top management. That was, and is, the GE Way! One of the guys in this group (and I honestly don't think there was a single female - and it didn't seem strange, at the time) was the son-in-law of the Chairman of the Board of GE, at the time. A little weird, but, I seemed to do every bit as well as he did, so I didn't let it bother me.

I did seem 'compelled,' it seems, to continue my outside education. Looking back, it is a bit surprising, but I think it was that I had doubts in the back of my mind of where this whole GE job thing was going and whether it was really what I wanted to be doing, once I figured out what it was - and who I was, I suppose.

Therefore, I enrolled in the MBA (Master of Business Administration) program at the University of Louisville, which offered an evening set of courses. Over the three years I was there (in Louisville), I completed 12 credit hours of work, 3 at a time, of which I was able to transfer 6 when I later restarted in the MBA Program at Drake University, in Des Moines.

Since this series of memories relates mostly to my work-related stuff, I'll not try to cover the 'more important' home and family stuff here. We have hundreds and hundreds of photos, of course, that are shared, from time to time, and still need to be organized better. We had wonderful visits from family, Bolger's, Smith's, Al, Jim, many more, as well as visits back to Iowa. Allison's first three or so years, including the infamous 'pulling the hot hamburger skillet off the stove' that resulted in some burns on her face. Annette went to private Kindergarten (see graduation photo, below) and then to public school, including 2 shifts to 'make better use of the buildings.' We have photos of her getting on the bus. We were very active in the fine United Methodist Church down the road a ways, singing in choir and all kids activities - real nice minister and his family.

I happened on the following, which I will choose as a representative photo…

One more thing... The gentleman that coordinated the FMP, a Mr. McGinty, who 'shared our evaluation results' with us... only seemed to ever have one criticism of me, to me face: I wasn't very good at 'small talk.' Well, duh, I wanted to say, I had work to do. I was ambitious. I did all I was told to do. I don't have time for 'small talk.'

Finally, one day, the 'word' came down from 'on high' - from up the chain of command - I had been chosen to received the coveted offer of a spot on the Corporate Audit Staff - the Holy Grail of GE assignments. Only 120 slots among 300,000-some employees of the company at that time. I said 'Yes!' And, we were off to Schenectady, New York. It was August, 1967.

Families are Forever!  ;-)