All or Nothing: An Autobiography

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All or Nothing

Trafford Publishing

Chapter One

After my retirement, decisions had to be made to exist in this society. Immediately after receiving my first official United States Air Force retirement check of $315.00, it wasn't enough money to buy a tooth pick to go with a glass of water, let alone enough change for a tip to leave for the waitress. The family and I talked freely of what had to be done to pay the basic bills. One consolation was that my wife was a qualified California Real Estate Broker, but that often didn't provide enough money to buy a loaf of bread and butter to put on the table, unless she closed some large real estate sales package. We had a give and take ordeal and had to weigh each option or requirement for funds. After researching all the choices of acceptable approaches, I elected to enter the electronics field using my VA education bill. My first step was to visit the Veterans Administration within the Los Angeles area. Many attempts were made because of changing government requirements on submission of required correspondence. Numerous forms had to be filled out correctly, because the amount of support would be based on the input information. So I lucked out for the maximum amount to be paid for attending. It was a good start for entering the electronics field and providing for the family. The Veterans Administration sent me an acceptance letter, so I applied to the Western Electronics Institute for a nine and a half months electronics course totaling 1,059 hours, this was for both class work and laboratory time.

I began my new 1960 civilian career by driving daily from Riverside, California to Western Electronics Institute located in Hollywood, California. [Photo 1-1] That was 52 miles one way. I did this for a while before I decided that a cheap hotel or motel would be a better solution. From the Riverside highway to Hollywood, California there was a bumper to bumper situation for no less than 39 miles, very monotonous and time consuming each day. I would arrive at Western Electronics Institute (WEI) minutes before the daily class was scheduled to start. No time to study the new notes on the blackboard or speak with the instructor. However, to change my driving habits I found a nice one room efficiency apartment one block from Western Electronics Institute that solved my problem.

If my wife wanted to visit me in Hollywood, California she had a choice of several things to do, the WEI school allowed visitors to attend classes and enjoy the technical briefings or laboratory work. This allowed the days to go by fast and allow your mind to absorb the information provided by the instructor.

The third one, go shopping, the City was large enough to engage in any of your choices. Culinary, clothing, sightseeing or be lazy, watch television, read and relax.

My old stand-by when my wife had things to do in Riverside, California was to relax in the apartment, review my notes, or go over laboratory work this was from Monday through Friday then return to Riverside, California for the weekend, which was a lots of turmoil with the heavy traffic.

After a couple of months, approximately August 1960, The Western Electronics Institute, Director Mr. George I. Alagna appointed me to be their Honor student and be on their Western Electronics Institute servicing calls, they were proud of the end results. I maintained a highly successful rate of achievement. In turn they could advertise as to the schools ability for electronic training under the G.I. Bill. All of us students were warned to prepare for the final exam on Thursday—prepare how? We all were present for 9 ½ months so what was the last day going to involve.

When I walked into the class room my attention was directed on the four class room "black boards" the test involved a continuous chain of questions, around the room, diagrams the such I had never seen before. It was a whole day of completing the electronics test!

At the end of the day it was like I was dragged, through a key hole, drained of all energies that I had at the start of the day. WHAT A TEST!

I graduated with a grade average of 90 ½. [Photo of Diploma 1-2]

A couple of days after graduating, 10 April 1961, I applied at the Sears, Roebuck & Company in Riverside, California for an electronics position and was accepted two days later. The manager gave me a top dollar position and training for two weeks. Then Sears gave me a raunchy route, reason being there were two employees that would do anything to complete an electronics service call on their route. Guess who always got the two employees customers from the previous day to correct their electronics problems? So I would get my fanny chewed royally from each of the disgruntled customers. Consequently, I had to remove each chassis and take it into the shop for repair, which should have been the responsibility of the two employees. Within two weeks I was the number one man on all of the Sears routes. In one day I sold 12 service maintenance contracts, serviced seven homes and traveled over two hundred miles. It pleased the management personnel highly and I was presented with a fairly large bonus. Because I was very conscientiously doing my Sears job and serviced several areas belonging to the Sears old fogies (20-25 years of faithful Sears service), there was no sense in me fighting with Sears managers over their favorite employees work performance. So I talked it over with my family about going into my own business near March Air Force Base, California. On my time off I surveyed the areas around the base for an ideal site. I gave Sears two week's notice. I then decided on Sunnymead, California. I had found a real nice building, reasonably priced. The owner really wanted someone available to repair his older model televisions and electronic gear that he had stored in his supply room and would sell in his store.

One of my buddies at Sears, qualified in washing machines, dryers and such, decided also to go in business in the building next to the one I contracted for. He signed the contract and we thrived in the area business. The service fees were very low keyed for the United States Air Force (USAF) personnel, so as a result the volume was tremendous. But the same thing happened with the owner; he started arguing on getting cheaper prices for his repair cost on TVs, electronics, and raising the building rent to where we were working for low wages. We could not survive. We began to look for new locations. I found one in Edgemont, California, approximately a half-mile from March Air Force Base. I took the building because of the space and availability to the highways. I didn't know the exact layout of March Air Force Base and wasn't thinking of runways heading towards the front of our new building, but they say lightning and accidents never strikes twice in the same location, so I took a chance that no aircraft would fall onto or into our building. Besides all of these things, nobody advised us about bad weather and the consequences of too much rain.

Three months later I opened Kuschel's TV, my own electronics service shop and began experiencing what it takes to be the civilian boss. Our business increased tremendously, we began selling several different named sets, Zenith, Admiral, Philco and Emerson. With numerous March Air Force Base personnel knowing of my USAF background and a former service member, I had more than enough work to do. In fact business was so good I had my Western Electronics Institute supervisor Harold Pillsbury help to troubleshoot sets on Saturday and Sundays. I averaged eleven sets coming in each day and I repaired about the same number. There was one problem that I couldn't take much longer. On rainy days, the awful rain storms in that area would make my store leak like a sieve. Water would run down the electrical leads onto my test instruments and with the amperage and voltage on the test bench and in the walls and ceiling it was unsafe for a human being to be inside the building. So I gave up the shop and took four months off for some rest. My current TV and electronics business location had been in a precarious area as March Air Force Base runways ran right toward my entrance door. I can't give the exact date or time, but a navigator friend on a B-47 aircraft was scheduled to fly an early flight. From the knoll in front of the business you could see part of the runway. When I exited my service truck after a service call a B-47 was approximately halfway down the runway coming toward me when the next thing I saw, was a ball of flame and oil-fuel smoke went up several hundred feet and I said a silent prayer for the crew. No one was saved from the B-47 accident. It was only a short distance in a straight line to my business from where the accident happened, so we had a possible problem for any future accidents that might occur. But the scientists say lightning doesn't hit in the same place twice. That may be true, but how about an aircraft accident, what would the chance be then? That was a big question only the man above could answer.

Then the March Air Force Base Exchange manager came to me and requested that I become the first Electronics Servicing Company on any United States Air Force Base. We discussed the contract between the base and myself. It was based on a percentage factor, electric heat and maintenance was in addition.

After opening my base business I got around to mowing the grass late at night because of house calls and installing antennas after work hours. My business needed to have a good appearance, not to look like a junk shop. I can vouch on the appearance as going beyond my efforts.

All of my electronics gear and television sets were inside the building. Then one night a burglar broke into my shop and stole all the expensive testing equipment. I had my Jackson oscilloscope in my truck so I saved that item. But the problem was my insurance company never had the chance to record serial numbers so I lost insurance funding on all the equipment. Being on March Air Force Base whoever thought this would happen, not me! So I began slowly to get necessary equipment to resume operation on base, doing a large volume of business satisfying everyone. A lot of my friends would come over and talk over old times at my shop location on the base. What happened to some of my old supervisors and working buddies?

This position lasted until the end of July 1963, when I started to get sick from working sixteen to eighteen hours per day, seven days a week. I contacted another electronics shop in Edgemont, California to take over the concessions. I didn't like this guy but he was the only one that was able to take over the business. He would present the customers with large repair bills that would choke a horse. He had no conscience problems; he only wanted to make money.

Then I went to the March Air Force Base flight surgeon Dr. Boyles. My system was all messed up. I could sleep twenty-four or more hours and never fully wake up. Dr. Boyles tested me for everything possible to get to the bottom of it. Since 1963 I had been plagued by health problems and taken many different tests, glucose testing, and physicals, that was almost my middle name, "Tests". Then I began to get well or feeling better as the end of 1963 was coming up.

When my health began to improve and I felt better I began to think of my future and what to do. Then I saw an advertisement in the Riverside newspaper that a new class for students was starting at California School of Automation specializing in International Business Machine (IBM) for computer programmers. I applied, took all the aptitude tests, passed and I enrolled for night classes. My thinking was the automation would be an enterprising experience for me. I learned that computer programmers were scarce and a premium position to hold. The school kept advising us of the position held. It would be more of a secret type of operation where you worked for one boss of that organization. He received all the IBM results and no one else; he disseminated the information to other personnel himself.

Regardless, I enjoyed each and every class gaining more knowledge of the program criteria. When the whole class was very sufficient in preparing programs, we would drive to the Lockheed Aircraft Company at the Ontario Airport and apply all the technical material into the IBM machines and behold, a typed and workable program would be available after a short time. Then we would apply all the machine information to a large sheet of program material so it made sense to whatever you decided to schedule into a feasible program, and disseminate the readable language to the workers or manager's for their input and control of any subject they required. When I became efficient in my work I graduated with honors on 3 June 1963.

One of my buddies asked me to go into the IBM School, teaching data processing to Arizona students. So a survey was ongoing, with Phoenix, Arizona as being the ideal area, so we found the correct building and leased IBM equipment. We were doing fine until the Republican Presidential candidate Barry Goldwater (R) was not doing so well. Upon winning the presidential position the Democrats took all defense work out of the state of Arizona. This time I had to declare the school closed, there was no way to get around the debts that I had accumulated. So our lawyers, accountants, and various companies did one outstanding job of clearing up all the problems with the funds I had, whereby everyone could get on with their lives. My seven employees acquired positions in schools within the Phoenix area. I stayed in Riverside, California and took a service manager position with Luds TV electronics and did very well financially, in addition, I also serviced stock machines that had input from the New York Stock Exchange to the customer.

I continued exploring civil service testing. There were no positions available and I was getting disappointed by all the turn downs. Sometime during November 1964 I put my name on a vacancy hiring list at March Air Force Base, Civilian Personnel Office (CPO) for a GS-11 position as a jet propulsion specialist. The CPO office contacted me and said I had the position and that the paperwork would be forthcoming to my residence. Before the week went by I again received word that a Lieutenant Colonel (LTC) had retired more recently than I, and might be more experienced.

In this case my name would be with-drawn, however, I kept looking, not getting depressed and wished the new propulsion person the best in that position. I knew some bases have their own rules and regulation on hiring. I believe I could have kept that position if I wanted to use Civil Service rules and sue for that job. It didn't mean that much for my ego factor, easy come, easy go. I never got discouraged and continued searching for a position by visiting all the post offices in or around Riverside, California.

To keep busy I took a temporary security guard position until 1 January 1966, then went back to be being retired. After so long showing my loyalty I had the opportunity to stay on but you can only do so much in a guard's position because the pay was small, so I moved on for greener grass.

I never gave up on getting a position that I would enjoy, there were several bases to visit and acquire information, besides I had a very experienced career in the Air Force, however, I doubt if anyone in my position would put up with my problem of not getting along with your boss for three years and not retire. Of course you can cut off your nose to spite your face, but I wasn't to give in all the time because a person doesn't understand the basic facts of management and takes the word of his "Yes" buddies to stop all sound maintenance decisions.

This was the main reason I wanted a challenging position in whatever field I elected to enter for a second career.

To enable me to stay ahead of any available positions in the government, especially Federal Government employment, I subscribed to a magazine "The Government Employee Exchange" which provided a person with available positions at bases in the Continental United States (CONUS) and overseas with the technical data required for each qualifying position. When I read the column, Technical, Professional Jobs that were open, with the United States Army Aviation Systems Command (AVSCOM) at St. Louis, Missouri, I proceeded to the Riverside Post Office for a copy to review. Upon receipt, I began to review the Aviation announcements. There were 25 aircraft equipment specialist GS-12 positions open for qualified personnel to submit correspondence.

In my case the statement was a broad view of the grades and positions available. The AVSCOM CPO was the deciding office to determine the position and grade level anyone would be offered in response to the bulletin.

(Continues...)

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Excerpted from All or Nothing by Wayne Kuschel Copyright © 2012 by Wayne Kuschel. Excerpted by permission of Trafford Publishing. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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