Part XI
MY LIFE STORY
My Quanex Years
(1995-2000)
Another new beginning
- Chief Operating
Officer (COO) of Quanex -
The executive recruiter was searching for an Executive Vice
President/COO for a $700 million revenue manufacturing company.
He asked for a brief summary of my career and for me to
e-mail him my resume’. He then described the opportunity that he
was filling. The
company was a manufacturer of steel and aluminum products and a
recycler of steel
and aluminum scrap.
It was based in Houston, TX with
domestic manufacturing plants generally located in the
upper mid-west. The
current Chairman and CEO was scheduled to retire in a year and
the current President and COO was scheduled to be promoted to
President and CEO.
The board wanted to bring in a new Executive Vice President and
COO who would serve for about five years until one of the
current Division Presidents was expected to be ready to assume
that responsibility.
This was the opportunity or me and it was perfect timing as I
would be 65 in five years and the company had a mandatory
retirement age of 65.
The executive recruiter asked if I was interested in
pursuing this opportunity, to I replied emphatically “absolutely
yes”. He advised me
that the company was Quanex, to which I replied that I was
familiar with Quanex’s steel making company, MacSteel, as GLC
had sold graphite electrodes to MacSteel’s two EAF plants.
He asked me how I would pitch myself for this opening to
Quanex, if I were him.
I replied that I would have an e-mail to him that day as
to how I would hope he would present my fit with Quanex’s
requirements and my qualification for the position. He replied
“that would be great”.
He also asked for three references.
One reference was Harry Skilton who the executive
recruiter knew and who had in fact given the recruiter my name
as a candidate. I
also gave him David Carpenter, John Hobbs and Bill Chorske’s
names and contact information.
I researched the company on-line and prepared an e-mail response
to the recruiter as to how I would suggest he present my
candidacy to Quanex.
In that presentation, I emphasized my background with GLC and
our experience serving the electric arc steel recycling
business, as well as my broad industrial experience from
managing autonomus divisions and companies within larger
corporations to managing acquisitions, divestitures and IPOs.
He presented my candidacy
promptly to Quanex,
utilizing essentially the suggested approach that I had proposed
to him. (I later found out).
Things moved quickly as early the next week, I received a
call from the search executive asking if I could
visit the Quanex
management that week
as Quanex had a management meeting scheduled for the following
week and if I was to be hired Quanex wanted me to participate in
that meeting..
I was in Houston that Thursday.
I interviewed with the Vern Oeschsle, the
President and COO, Wayne Rose the CFO and Joe Peery the
VP of Human Resources.
I also met briefly with Robert Snyder, the
Chairman and CEO.
Vern Oeschsle had joined Quanex in 1993 after serving as
the Executive Vice President and Chief Executive Officer of
Allied Signal’s Automotive Sector.
Quanex,
especially MacSteel sold a considerable amount of product to the
automotive and automotive supply companies.
Vern was hired to be Quanex’s Executive Vice-President
and Chief Operating Officer with the understanding that he would
succeed Robert Snyder
as Quanex’s President and
CEO. Vern
was seven years my
junior.
Vern and I discussed my background and Quanex’s executive needs.
He was totally familiar with my resume and work
experience, although he had not yet checked with any of my
references – in fact I don’t believe that he ever did.
Near the end of our
discussion, he
asked me how soon I could
begin employment with Quanex, if I was extended an offer.
To which I replied that I could start tomorrow!
We discussed the upcoming Quanex Management Meeting and
the advantage of my participating in it.
Wayne Rose had been Quanex’s CFO
for a number
of years and was
thoroughly familiar with the company
and its history. He
reviewed with me Quanex’s financial position, it’s profitability
challenges and its executive needs from his perspective.
Joe Peery likewise was a
long time employee Quanex.
He reviewed with me the strengths and weaknesses of the
existing organization and reviewed with me the executive
benefits if I were to become an officer of Quanex. The
interviews all went well, as it seemed as if I would be a good
fit with the current management team and my background almost
precisely met Quanex’s needs.
Joe Peery conducted the final interview and told me that I would
likely receive an
offer to join Quanex as Executive Vice President and COO.
He discussed with me the employee benefits program at
Quanex, including a generous relocation/moving package.
I responded to Joe, that if I was offered
and accepted the job that
we would move to Houston, but that we would not be selling our
house in Lake Harmony. Instead,
we would purchase a town house in Houston and move only a
minimal amount of furnishings to Houston.
Consequently, I would appreciate Quanex’s consideration
of paying me a relocation lump sum of $25,000 instead of a
moving/relocation expense, to which he readily agreed
(Apparently the cost to Quanex to relocate the Oeschsles a
couple of years earlier was some six figures! Joe considered my
request a bargain.)
As I was preparing to leave the Quanex offices, Vern asked me if
I could return early the
following week with my wife to have dinner with his wife and
him. I replied that
we would be delighted to join them.
Vern wanted his wife’s assessment of Karen and me, prior
to making me an offer.
Karen and I traveled to Houston the following Monday and
had an enjoyable dinner with Vern and his wife at their Houston
Club. Upon
conclusion of dinner, Vern told us that we would be receiving an
offer to join Quanex the next day.
He advised me that he would like me to plan to attend the
management meeting at the end of the following week.
I readily agreed to do so, assuming their offer was
acceptable to Karen and me.
We did receive an offer to join Quanex effective September 15,
1995, my initial position was to be Executive Vice President,
Manufacturing Operations, with the understanding that this was
only for a few months until Robert Snyder announced his
retirement from Quanex.
At that time Vern would be named Chairman and CEO, and I
would be named President and COO. (This in fact happened as of
January 1, 1996.) It was
an acceptable offer of compensation, an annual bonus, stock
options and an executive benefit program which included an
enhanced retirement package, health care, a golf course and
Houstonian Club membership and a luxury model company car.
I accepted the offer and attended the management meeting.
It was a great introduced
to the Quanex Management.
This group included the corporate officers and the
presidents of the four Quanex divisions/companies.
Quanex was incorporated in 1927 as Michigan Seamless Tube
Company (MSTC), which was still one of four Quanex companies.
Michigan Seamless Tube Company survived the Great
Depression and then significantly benefited from sales to the
aircraft manufacturing business as WWII jump kicked demand for
MSTC’s products.
After the war, MSTC expanded rapidly into the oil field supply
business by opening a facility in Texas, making complementary
acquisitions and focusing its technology on oil field piping
requirements.
Early in the 1970s, MSTC began developing plans to build an EAF
steel mill in Jackson, MI.
The plant was built and became
the model for specialty EAF steel making
in combination with continuous
casting of the high-grade engineered steel bar.
The facility was named The MacSteel Mill.
This facility became the foundation of a new division in
MSTC, the MacSteel Company.
In 1977 MSTC was renamed Quanex and the corporate
headquarters was relocated to Houston, TX.
Quanex continued expanding its oil field and related businesses
by way of acquisitions and new facilities
while it divested some of the businesses which did not
serve Quanex’s primary markets.
In 1981 Quanex announced plans to build a second EAF
steel mill in Fort Smith, AK utilizing the steel making and
casting process installed in the Jackson plant.
The new plant included some significant improvements on
the original Jackson plant.
In 1982, Quanex purchased LaSalle Steel a cold forging
steel processor based in Hammond, IN.
LaSalle was the third of four divisions of Quanex when I
joined the company.
The U.S. energy industry entered an abrupt downturn, in the
early 1980s causing many of the
industry’s suppliers to fail or severely scramble to
survive. Quanex
decided to refocus its business away from the volatile oil field
supply business.
During this time the MacSteel Company focused on making very
high quality engineered steel bar.
These products were precisely formulated steel alloys
custom manufactured for specific customers
to a precise steel
formulation.
Consequently, MacSteel’s customers purchased full heats (or
batches) of steel which was then continuously cast to precisely
dimensioned steel bar - which was circular in cross section.
The precision of the continuous casting and the
subsequent rolling of the bar, permitted the customer to order
steel bar from MacSteel
that required little processing prior to the customer’s forging
operations. The
precisely formulated and rolled
engineered bar enabled MacSteel’s customers to avoid several
manufacturing steps in its operations.
Consequently, MacSteel sold its products at premium
prices.
In 1989, Quanex purchased Nichols-Homeshield an aluminum sheet
and fabricated products manufacturer which was the fourth
division in the Quanex Company when I joined Quanex.
Quanex built a large aluminum recycling plant and sheet
rolling plant in Davenport, IA which began operations in 1991 to
provide now renamed Nichols Aluminum with a strong aluminum
supply position.
This new recycling plant and rolling mill, a custom/specialty
rolling mill in Lincolnshire, IL (a suburb of Chicago), which
produced various gauges and widths of rolled and flat aluminum
sheet and two fabrication plants serving mainly the housing
industry with shaped aluminum products for windows, doors and
similar industrial products as well as a significant amount of
residential and commercial window and door screens constituted
the Nichols Aluminum Company.
The Quanex management committee included the presidents of each
of the four divisions plus Snyder, Oeschsle, Rose, Peery, Viren
Parikh, the corporate controller and myself.
However, each operating division operated quite
autonomously as long as they achieved their operating goals and
plans. Each division
prepared its proposed operating and capital plans for the year.
Once the plans were approved, the division’s performance
was measured against its approved plan.
The divisions were expected to scout out possible
acquisition targets within their markets.
The corporate officers
were responsible for formulating the corporate strategy,
including acquisitions which was then presented to the Quanex
Board of Directors for approval. The company’s markets were
capital goods and industrial machinery, transportation, aluminum
products customers and energy.
The days shortly after the management meeting, Karen returned to
Houston to join me in house/condo hunting.
We focused our search in Houston’s Galleria District, as
Quanex’s headquarters office was located on Houston’s I-610 Loop
near the Galleria District.
We found a small townhouse development about a
mile from the Quanex office and relatively near the
Houstonian Club in which there was a large fitness center to
which I was provided a membership. I worked out
nearly every workday
morning when I was in our Houston office.
The townhouse was unoccupied and we closed within two
weeks. The address
was 4742 Post Oak Timber, Unit 41, Houston , TX 77056-2208.
Our only concern with this otherwise ideal location was
it was about thirty yards from a small creek that typically had
very little water year around, except when Houston experienced
very heavy rains, particularly with hurricanes that visited
Houston. We however
were fortunate in the five years that we owned the property not
once did this creek flood and although we had some very hard
rains none of them lasted long enough to cause this creek to
flood.
Our fourteenth home -
The two story townhouse was about 1800 square feet with a decent
sized kitchen, dining and living room plus a powder room on the
main level, along with a two car attached garage.
The upstairs had a master
bedroom-bathroom suite along with a second bedroom and bath plus
a decent sized third bedroom which I used for my office.
We shipped a modest amount of clothing to Houston and
purchased moderately priced furniture, kitchen necessities,
dishware and flatware for housekeeping in Houston. Karen drove
her convertible from Lake Harmony. Everything else was left in
our Lake Harmony home.
Karen expected to spend most of the summers in Lake
Harmony home to avoid the Houston heat and humidity. I planned
to schedule my business
trips to end up in Lake Harmony several weekends during the
summer. Our good
friends, Don and Pat Todd looked after the Lake Harmony house
when we were not there. We
were moved into our Houston home in just four weeks after
accepting the Quanex job.
We later learned that our townhouse was just three short
blocks from President and Mrs. George Herbert Walker Bush’s
Houston home. (They
spent their summers in their ocean front Kennebunkport, ME
home.) Karen and I
walked past their home many times when we walked around the
neighborhood.
Moreover, we frequently saw the Bushes at the local polling
place as they and I both voted early.
Both President and Mrs. Bush were very friendly and even
approachable in this setting.
Karen loved driving her convertible around Houston and
thoroughly enjoying Houston’s fine weather most of the year.
We still had the mini-van in Lake Harmony when she was
there enjoying relief from Houston’s hot and humid summer days.
We also were delighted to be just three and one-half
hours from Kim and Dave’s by auto given normal traffic.
I scheduled plant visits for most of the next several weeks to
become familiar with the company’s facilities, products and
management.
Concurrently, I kept in close touch with dad and particularly
sisters Beverly and Janie, both of
whom were registered nurses about his cancer diagnosis
and prospective treatments if any.
Dad was in decent spirits, although I am not sure he
totally understood his health status and what the near future
would be.
Christmas 1995, was celebrated at Kim’s in Southlake.
Cindie’s flew into Dallas on Christmas day.
We had a wonderful Christmas although it was one of the
first Christmases that we
did not spend with dad and my siblings and families.
Dad, Beverly and Allan spent Christmas at
Dick and
Judy’s in Glenwood, IA.
Dad was frail but in good
spirits. Dick remembers dad got a kick out of Allan placing a
big Christmas Red Bow on Dick’s almost finished "Annex" out
building.
Prior to my orientation tours of Quanex division’s headquarter
offices and plants, Vern had advised me
that he was going to
“fire “ Ted Olt, Nichols Aluminum’s president, something that he
had intended to do for some time but never got around to do.
He advised me that he was going to call him the next day
and “fire him” before my visit to the Nichols Aluminum
operations. My
response to Vern was that while I was not
that familiar with Nichols Aluminum operations or Mr. Olt,
I agreed that Nichols was under performing and that nothing in
Mr. Olt’s plans indicated to me that he was prepared to lead
Nichol’s to better performance.
I advised Vern that I did not agree with “firing someone
over the phone” and that I would travel to Davenport with Joe
Peery and we would terminate Mr. Olt’s Quanex employment face to
face. After assuring
ourselves that Mr. Olt would be in his Davenport office the
following week, Joe and I travelled there the following week and
terminated Mr. Olt’s Quanex employment.
We immediately initiated a search for Mr. Olt’s successor as no
current employee of Nichols or Quanex was identified as a
possible replacement.
After an extensive search lasting over four months, we
hired Terry Schroeder who had a reasonably solid background in
aluminum products manufacturing as President of Nichols
Aluminum.
During the interim, the various managers of Nichols Aluminum
reported directly to me.
This included Jim Gulliford who was running the
Homeshield plants located in Rice Lake, WI and in
Chatsworth, IL The
Rice Lake plant was dedicated to manufacturing window screens.
It had developed a very efficient way of manufacturing
the standard size screens and supplied several major window and
door manufacturing companies with their window and door screen
requirements, nearly all on an exclusive vendor basis.
The plant delivered screens in a “just in time” basis to
its major customer, negating the need for the customer to
receive and store the screens prior to shipping them to their
customers. The cost
savings were shared with the customer. The Rice Lake plant was
quite profitable. The plant also excelled in making odd sized,
odd shaped and other special order screens.
The Chatsworth plant supplied a few proprietary products
and a range of standard roll formed aluminum products.
It also had a nice business making custom shaped aluminum
products for contract customers.
Both plants were non-union and the employees benefitted
from a modestly generous profit sharing plan which helped
considerably in labor relations.
Jim Gulliford was a good executive, hands on, knew all of
his employees personally, interacted very effectively with his
customers and suppliers.
In retrospect we probably should have promoted him to be
President of Nichols Aluminum.
Regardless, after terminating Ted Olt, Gulliford
continued to report to me.
The other Nichols Aluminum managers including the Davenport
manufacturing manager, the Lincolnshire, IL specialty rolling
plant manager, the sales manager, the controller and the
personnel officer, reported to me from the time we terminated
Ted Olt until Schroeder was hired.
During this time, I spent at least two days a week in
Davenport on Nichols Aluminum business.
Normally I was able to schedule my time in Davenport
around a weekend and would visit dad on the weekend, as it was
about a 150 minute drive each way.
Therefore, I was able to spend most of Friday evening
with dad as well as nearly all of the weekend.
I believe that I spent at least a dozen weekends of high
quality time with dad, including the weekend of his 83rd
birthday, which we spent quietly with brother Bob and Velda.
On some of these trips Karen accompanied me and joined in
with the weekend visits. Dad
did not want to discuss his future, but understandably wanted to
recall the good times of his life.
Again, Janie remembers dad was very
weak at the time of Justin's Evansville College graduation in
June 1996. Nancy had
spent about a month with dad in Iowa.
She and Bob promised dad, that if there was any way
possible, they would make sure he was able to attend Justin’s
commencement in Evansville, IN. It
was a very tough trip for him, but dad never complained. He
said, "I haven't missed a graduation, yet". And, I believe he
only missed Rich's college graduation. Velda and Nancy helped
bathe and dressed him. The trip home was equally difficult and
he was worn out. Nancy needed to get back home so Janie spent a
week with him, accompanying him to doctor’s appointments,
including a blood transfusion. While Dad was getting his blood
work drawn, Janie sought out Sarah Davis (our first cousin –
Bud’s daughter), as she was a nursing supervisor at Deaconess
Hospital. Sarah put her in contact with a visiting nurse
resource. They came to dad’s house and assessed just what needs
he might have staying at home. She knew that Velda was
continually by his side but she needed help whenever dad needed
assistance getting out of bed, attending to his personal needs,
etc.”
Vern received a call from Bob Sammons the majority owner of
Piper Impact, an aluminum cold forming company based in New
Albany, MS not far from Tupelo.
He was inquiring about Quanex’s interest in purchasing
Piper Impact.
Vern learned what he could from this owner and asked his
assistant to research the company.
He learned that the company was founded during WWII to
provide casings for military shells and related materials by
cold forging/stamping materials, virtually always aluminum, into
the desired shape.
The company was approached by Morton Thiokol, the aerospace
giant who planned to add automotive
airbags to its product line.
Morton Thiokol wanted Piper to make the aluminum
cannisters that contained the working components of the airbags
including the explosive charge which deployed the airbags.
Piper’s primary business was supplying these cannisters
to Morton Thiokol. Indeed, Piper had opened a secondary plant in
Park City, UT to have a facility close to Morton Thiokol’s air
bag plant in Ogden, UT.
Automotive air bags were developed as a vehicle safety device
beginning in the 1960s and 1970s.
Initially, the designs were based on using compressed air
to inflate the bags however that
technology was determined to be unsatisfactory as the
deployment was too slow.
Eventually, the industry turned to an explosive charged
gas-inflated airbag.
This concept was perfected
in 1994 by TRW who provided the majority of the initial
automotive airbags. It
wasn’t until about 1990 that airbags were installed in most
autos. Beginning in 1998 model year, airbags at least in the
front seat driver and passenger side have been required. Morton
Thiokol, a company founded on rocket propulsion saw the
developing automotive
airbag market as a natural for them, however they needed to
partner with a manufacturer of the cannister which would contain
the device. Morton
Thiokol chose Piper Impact as that partner.
Piper Impact benefitted handsomely from this very rapid
growth in the early to mid 1990s.
Piper Impact’s financial resources were being challenged
by the rapid increase in airbag cannister demand and Piper’s
share of that business.
The owners decided to find a buyer who had the resources
to take advantage of this market opportunity.
Vern, Wayne Rose and I scheduled a visit with the owners of
Piper Impact for the Tuesday following Father’s Day, June 16,
1996 at their facilities in MS.
The weekend previous to the meeting,
Karen and I joined
visited dad along with brothers and sisters Bob, Dick, Beverly
(& Allan). Janie was unable to be
there, as she and Jerry were driving to WSU to pick Jill up for
the summer. Dad had previously told Janie he needed a haircut
for Father's Day..
It was a wonderful weekend with family, although dad’s
health was clearly a concern.
He was less active but excited to have all of us there
with him. The
weather was very cooperative and we enjoyed a very nice Sunday
cookout on the outside deck.
Allan and I both left late Sunday afternoon to return to
our work. The others
stayed with dad,
including Velda.
Janie always mentioned how well Dad
took care of his physical appearance. She always attributed that
to knowing that Velda helped him so much. Janie called Dad on
Father's Day - late Sunday afternoon - he said with a chuckle,
that "The boys (Jim and Bob) got me in the shower, and they darn
near froze me by the time I got out." She remembers how Dad
still a sense of humor. What
a sight, two grown men helping dad into that small shower stall,
helping him shower and then drying him off.
Dad was so thin it is no
wonder that he was cold after showering. Dad was sleeping when
Janie called on Monday PM, and she never heard his voice again.
He died Tuesday morning.
When our meeting began with Piper Impact’s two owners – Bob
Sammons and Marshall Robbins - in
Sammon’s office, I received a call from my sister,
Beverly who I knew was with dad.
I excused myself and took the call.
She told me that dad had died a few minutes earlier with
her, Karen and Velda
surrounding him. Dad
was not feeling well that morning and was still
in bed late morning when he passed.
I advised the group in our meeting
that my father had just
died and that I needed to excuse myself.
I caught a ride to the Memphis airport and took the next
plane to Des Moines via St. Louis.
I arrived late in the afternoon and joined in the
terrible duty of handling the arrangements for dad’s services.
Nancy, Neal, Allan, Janie and Jerry joined us as promptly
as they could.
Dad’s services were held on Friday afternoon at the Estel-Perrin-Avey
Funeral Home, with visitation the evening before.
Brother Bob did a masterful job of adding to the funeral
ceremony with prepared comments engaging the service attending
guests. Nearly all
of our family were able to return to Iowa for dad’s services.
As were most of his surviving brothers and sisters and
many of their children.
Ten of dad’s thirteen grandchildren were able to attend
and they served as casket bearers.
Dad was buried in the family plot in the Hartland
Cemetery where he joined mom and much of mom’s family.
The Hartland Cemetery Davis plot is also where Karen’s
ashes and a portion of Cindie’s ashes are placed and where a
portion of my ashes will be placed.
We six siblings met with dad’s attorney the following week to
hear dad’s decisions about his estate.
Dad had previously deeded his real property, the
farmstead to the six of we siblings, so we already knew that.
He appropriately appointed Bob and Dick as his estate
executors. The six
of us
jointly agreed to keep the farm and to rent out the
farmland to the current renters, the brothers Hupfeld.
We also agreed to divide the property on which the house
and the pasture between the house and the county road from which
it was accessed from the balance of the farm land and to sell
that portion separately.
Bob and Dick handled the details of dealing with the men
who had been renting dad’s farmland for several years as well as
selling the house and pasture.
The renters would continue renting dad’s property for
three years when they proposed that we sell them the property.
Bob engaged a local realtor to research the value of the
property based on the sales of similar farm land in the area.
The sale was closed with the renters where in each of
we siblings
received a partial payment in cash and a five year note for the
balance. After completing their obligation to us, the buyers
decided to sell the property they purchased from us and used the
proceeds to purchase land nearer their home place.
Fortuitously, our family had not planned to have a summer
reunion in 1996, however we planned to return to Glacier Lodge,
in Estes Park in 1997.
At the 1997 reunion, the second generation requested that
we plan the reunions for every other year, to give that
generation the opportunity to plan other activities in the
alternate years.
Karen and I returned to Houston after
dad’s service to
catch up with my Quanex responsibilities.
Vern and Wayne had a productive meeting with the two
owners of Piper Impact.
Wayne was working the numbers and Vern was communicating
with his contacts in the automotive industry to assess Piper
Impact’s industry status.
In as much as Morton Thiokol was a relatively new
supplier to the automotive industry and Piper Impact had little
other automotive industry connection, neither company had an
automotive relationship on which to base a reference.
However, Morton Thiokol was exceptionally well known in
the rocket industry and Piper Impact had long standing customers
in various industrial markets, we were able to get a good read
on both company’s reputation.
Neither Piper Impact or Quanex saw a need to engage the
use of an investment banker in the proposed transaction.
Additionally, Vern and several of Quanex’s cold forming
engineers had an excellent understanding of Piper Impact’s
technology.
Piper Impact’s product lines, customers and technology all fit
nicely with Quanex’s and the financial projections provided by
Piper Impact were thoroughly analyzed by Quanex’s CFO and his
department. Vern and
I, accompanied Bob Sammons on a trip to Ogden, UT to meet with
and assess the Piper Impact- Morton Thiokol relationship and the
ease of
transitioning Piper Impact’s ownership to Quanex.
The business, environmental, financial and human resource
evaluations all supported Quanex’s possible acquisition of
Piper. There were no
legal due diligence issues and the proposed purchase price made
sense and was easily financed by Quanex’s strong balance sheet.
Moreover, Bob Sammons the key owner committed to
continuing to manage Piper Impact for Quanex for a period of a
year but with the
understanding that he would only be required to spend about
one-half time.
Marshall Robbins wanted to retire and that did not pose a
problem. The
acquisition was approved by Quanex’s board of directors and the
transaction closed.
Bob Sammons promoted his most capable manager to the position of
General Manager – Piper Impact who then reported to Sammons, who
in turn reported to me.
Sammons was a very capable manager and an effective sales
executive. He worked
well with us and his newly appointed Piper Impact General
Manager. He had me accompany the two of them on visits to Morton
Thiokol. From day
one of Piper Impact being a fifth division of Quanex,
Piper Impact contributed to Quanex’s financial
performance.
Quanex’s financial performance and progress against its
operating goals was satisfactory, however Nichols Aluminum
continued to drag down Quanex’s overall accomplishments.
MacSteel, Homeshield and Piper Impact were contributing
nicely. I spent
a disproportionate amount of my time working with Nichols
Aluminum. Nichols
was operating in a commodity market and pricing leverage was
almost non-existent.
Vern, Wayne and I strategized on other acquisitions and
businesses to add to Quanex’s portfolio.
Bill Clinton won re-election in 1996 as the U.S. President,
against Bob Dole as Clinton had embraced some of the Republican
programs from their Contract For America, e.g., welfare reform.
However, the Republicans retained control of both the
house and senate.
The picture below, taken about this time, is one of my very
favorite pictures of Cindie and her sons.
L to R: Kevin, Adam,
Cindie, Brad And Andrew
At Thanksgiving, Kim invited Dick and Judy, who were Dallas
Cowboy fans as well as Beverly and Allan
to join Karen and I at Kim’s for Thanksgiving celebration
and tor Dick and Judy to join David in the Zale’s box at the
stadium. I don’t
remember who won the game, but Dick and Judy were thrilled to be
“entertained” in the Zale’s stadium box.
We all thoroughly enjoyed the partial family get
together. We men
assembled an on-the-ground tree house in Kim and David’s back
yard as requested by Kyle and Brett.
Karen and I. joined Cindie, Brian and their four boys at Kim’s
for Christmas in 1996.
It was a joyous time and Cindie’s family thoroughly
enjoyed the Southlake, TX weather and did not miss the normal
New England’s wintery Christmas.
The twelve us really appreciated the opportunity to be
together for a week and strengthening our very close family
ties. The six boys
are very close in age, are
good friends and get along very well.
We are very proud of them and as write this in 2023 even
more proud of them as the youngest of them, Adam will be 31
years old in just one month!
Progress at Quanex continues -
Wayne Rose, was a very capable financial executive who wanted to
be in a position to assume general management responsibility.
Vern Oeschsle advised Wayne that he needed some line
management experience to put himself in a position to move to a
senior general management/executive position.
Consequently, Wayne lobbied hard to replace Bob Sammons
as President of Piper Impact.
In 1997 we agreed to his request and Wayne then reported
to me. We began a
search for a Financial Vice President of Quanex.
We filled this position with Terry Murphy a capable and
experienced financial executive.
During this search, I assumed the additional
responsibility of Financial Vice-President and CFO.
Quanex expanded its Piper Impact business with the subsequent
acquisition of an unrelated Dutch operation much like Piper
Impact although not as large and with a narrower product line.
This Dutch company was almost totally dependent on
automotive airbag cannister sales to European auto manufacturers
suppliers. Wayne and
I visited the plant and reviewed its operations, business model,
technology and prospects.
Wayne was excited with the possibility of adding this
company to his and to Quanex’s portfolio.
I was reluctant as I was seeing potential cutthroat
competition in both Piper Impact and the Dutch company’s
business. Vern
however, based on his automotive experience and confidence that
both Piper and the Dutch company could successfully compete in
this business, overruled me, sided with Wayne and the Dutch
company was acquired.
Concurrently, a competitor of Quanex LaSalle’s cold forming
business approached Vern about the possibility of purchasing
LaSalle to enhance their business.
This divestiture made sense for Quanex and for the buyer.
A price was agreed to and this transaction was closed
about the same time as the purchase of the Dutch company was
completed. In 1998 a
Nichols Competitor Decatur Aluminum, located in Decatur, AL was
purchased and added to Nichols Aluminum.
The facility was renamed
Nichols Aluminum Alabama.
We also spun of Michigan Seamless Tube and Gulf States
Tube as those businesses were no longer central to Quanex’s
business. Two years
later Quanex purchased Imperial Products and Temroc Metals and
both of these operations to the Homeshield operations.
In 1997, the Davis Family summer reunion was again held at
Glacier Lodge in Estes Park.
It was the first family reunion for which both our mom
and dad were no longer with us.
Not having the two of them with us was a jolting
realization that life goes on even if individuals don’t.
It was a fun although less joyous reunion.
In 1997, Joe Peery, decided to retire from Quanex and move
closer to their family in OK.
After an extensive search,
Paul Giddens was hired as Vice President of Human
Resources.
Paul was an experienced human resources executive.
He transitioned very quickly into his new role and served
us well in that function.
Karen and I joined Kim’s for Thanksgiving in 1997 in their
Southlake home. We
again celebrated Christmas 1997 in Southlake with Kim’s, however
Cindie’s did not come to Southlake, instead Kim’s, Karen and I
flew to Boston and joined Cindie’s at their favorite local ski
resort, Loon, NH. We
celebrated a second Christmas with Cindie’s.
Lynn Swanson Fite receives new lungs -
Our niece Lynn Swanson Fite, who had suffered with Cystic
Fibrous for her entire 50 years of life needed her Cystic
Fibrous ruined lungs replaced and began the tortuous road of
qualifying and preparing for this very challenging surgery in
middle 1997, was finally scheduled to have the surgery on
January 28, 1998.
Her surgery, while a significant challenge, was successful and
her recovery quite remarkable.
She had renewed stamina and as I write this, she has
celebrated her 64th birthday! Although she currently
now has only about ¼ of a functioning lung, she does
exceptionally well and uses oxygen only on occasion.
Our family adventure trip to Alaska -
In July we repeated the Davis Family Adventure of the earlier
trip to Africa but this time it was to Alaska.
None of the family had been to Alaska
except me on earlier flights from the U.S. to Japan when
the planes typically stopped for refueling in Anchorage and my
one business trip to the North Slope of Alaska.
Cindies, Kim’s and we flew to Vancouver, BC where we
overnighted in a hotel near the dock.
We board a cruise ship the next day for our six day
cruise to Anchorage via the long beautiful Alaska coast line.
Standing, L to R: Andrew, Kyle, Brad, Brett, Kevin and Adam.
Sitting bottom to top: Brian, Cindie, Jim, Karen, David
and Kim on board the cruise ship.
We arrived at Ketchikan, AK the second morning and spent the day
touring that fishing village.
The six grandsons, Brian, Dave and I chartered a fishing
boat and attempted to catch a salmon or
two. The
fishing was not good but each grandson caught a nice
sized salmon. Andrew caught the biggest one
which we took back to the
ship. The chef
prepared our family a salmon dinner with the catch.
While we boys
were fishing, Cindie spent her time kayaking while Kim and Karen
learned about the making of Totem Poles from a Native American.
Grandad Helps Adam Land His Salmon
Karen And Cindie Touring Ketchikan
Karen and Kim Touring Ketchikan
During the night the ship sailed to Juneau and again docked
early in the morning.
We toured the state’s capital city, flew in two
helicopters to and landed on a glacier. We spent time hiking on
part of the glacier and observing huge crevasses in it before
returning to the ship for the night.
The next morning, we docked at a small fishing village of
Skagway, which was also a gate-way to the Klondike gold rush
area of Alaska and Canada.
We toured the fishing village and did a float trip on a
nearby river to observe the tremendous number of Bald Eagles
that resided there.
We also visited a raptor care center which took in injured
raptors, particularly eagles, which are particularly susceptible
to being struck by vehicles
on the various roadways as the raptors fed on road kill
in the winter months.
Overnight we sailed to Glacier Bay a national park
comprised of a large bay essentially surrounded by glaciers
emptying into the ocean bay.
In about 1850 there were some 80 glaciers, defined as ice fields
of at least one-tenth of a square kilometer or some 230 acres of
area. By 2015 there
were some 26 named glaciers which met the definition and today
it is even less. Our ship was able to sail sufficiently into the
bay that it could center itself amongst the glaciers.
While the ship held that position we passengers were able
to watch and hear the very large “Crack” as huge chucks of ice
“calved” into the bay.
Each individual calving resulted in this awesome sound.
We could also
observe marine wildlife swimming in the bay and sunning
themselves on the floating ice bobbing in the water. We sailed
from Glacier Bay to Seward, AK where we disembarked our cruise
ship and boarded buses for a three hour ride to Anchorage.
We overnighted in Anchorage and boarded the train to Denali
National Park the next day.
The train had glass domed cars enabling us to see the
wonderful countryside as the train sped north.
We travelled about 200 miles and arrived at the south
Denali train station which was conveniently located to the large
Denali Princess
lodge/hotel where we spent one very full day and two nights.
We arrived late in afternoon.
We had not booked any tours for the day as we were told
that only about 1/3 of the visitors to Denali actually see the
spectacular mountain as it hides behind clouds
much of the time. At
that time of the year, Alaska has daylight nearly 24 hours a
day. We could not
see Denali when we were riding the train nor when we checked
into the hotel. At
breakfast the following morning Denali was still shrouded in
clouds, however, some of the guests were commenting about “how
magnificent Denali was”!
I asked them when they had observed it.
To
which they replied that the clouds had receded during the night
and Denali was quite visible. When that happened the hotel staff
had awakened them. I was quite disappointed as I was convinced
that we had missed our only chance to see Denali.
We enjoyed a wonderful trail ride in the forest at the
base of Denali that morning and returned to the hotel for lunch.
While sitting on an outdoor patio eating, the clouds
suddenly left Denali and we were in awe at the sight of it.
Brian promptly
called a local company that provided charter flights of Denali.
He was able to book two small planes each of
which carried six passengers.
We enjoyed the one hour flight around Denali.
That is those of us who stayed awake for the flight.
All of the grandsons except Kevin slept through most of
the flights.
Kevin had a new camera which he brought on the trip and he
stayed awake to take photos of Denali.
Later in the afternoon, we had a wonderful guided
canoeing trip in a local river which was teeming with wildlife,
particularly waterfowl.
Kevin Took This Picture Of Denali From The Outdoor Patio Where
We Lunched
The next day we boarded the train to Fairbanks.
In Fairbanks we spent a day on a wonderful river cruise
which stopped by a dogsled training facility operated by a
previous Iditarod dogsled race winner, stopped for a tour of
a Native American village and were entertained by a pilot
of a sea plane who landed and took off from the very wide river
on which we were
cruising. We also
spent a day touring Fairbanks which included a stop at a point
on the Alyeska crude oil pipeline. The next day we boarded our
flight to Seattle and from there to our respective final
destinations. It was another wonderful family trip.
That fall, Dave enrolled in the University of Texas, at Dallas
Executive MBA program, in which he excelled. While most of his
classmates were college graduates, Dave’s extensive business
career enabled him to enroll and compete in this program. At
Zales, his mentor and boss from JB Robinson who attracted Dave
to Zales had left.
Dave reported directly to a lady executive with a strong jewelry
background. She and
Dave worked together effectively.
In May of 1999, Dave was promoted to President of Zales
of Canada which was just recombined with Zales U.S.
Dave and family continued living in Southlake, however
Dave commuted to Toronto for his Zales of Canada responsibility.
Regardless, he finished his MBA work and graduated in May
2000. We had a wonderful
graduation party as Dave’s father and mother from Columbus, OH
traveled to Texas to be with him for his graduation.
Zales of Canada was soon integrated back into Zales U.S.
and Dave was no longer required to work out of Toronto.
The Republicans kept control of the Senate and House in the 1998
elections, as Bill Clinton was engaged in fighting a scandal
involving sex with a young
intern working in the
Whitehouse.
He was impeached by the House however, the Senate failed to
convict him in a trial conducted in January 1999.
Bev, Allan, Dick, Judy, Karen and I celebrated 1998 Thanksgiving
with Kim, Dave, Kyle and Brett.
We also spent some wonderful time with Kim and Dave’s
wonderful friends Debbi and Doug Wannacott and their two sons
who were Kyle and Brett’s age. That Christmas we again
celebrated a wonderful holiday with Cindie’s at Kim’s in
Southlake.
In 1999 we again returned to Glacier Lodge for our Davis Family
summer reunion.
Glacier Lodge was showing its age and held less attraction for
us, particularly as our family continued to expand.
Karen and I continued to enjoy Houston, however she spent
too much time alone in Lake Harmony during the summers which was
not helpful to her excessive drinking and smoking, as well as
leading a sedative lifestyle with very little exercise or even
activity. She had no
real hobbies and even though she golfed a bit she would not go
out alone nor did she have friends who golfed.
She seldom exercised in her lifetime, even to the extent
of walking very much.
All this combined with too many years of smoking and
alcohol took a toll on her physically.
Karen and I joined Kim’s for Thanksgiving in Southlake, their
last Thanksgiving in their first Southlake house.
Kim and Dave purchased a new house near their current
house, which was located on a golf course and had a small
swimming pool with a very nice sized hot tub.
This home was newly constructed with more room, a
mother-in-law’s suite.
We enjoyed helping them move into this house and in
making last minute finishing details.
For Thanksgiving, Bev and
Allan again returned to Texas to join us.
One of the projects that we men undertook was to
disassemble Kyle and Brett’s tree house and to use the recovered
lumber to construct a large workbench, cabinets and other
features in the garage in Dave’s new house.
We spent the first Christmas 1999 with Kim’s in Southlake and
then the six of us traveled to Cindie’s and had a second family
Christmas there.
Cindie and Brian’s large Westford house accommodated we twelve
family members exceptionally well.
There was much concern in the technical and business world about
the changes required for all of the computerized systems around
the world as to whether or not the change from 1999 to 2000
would be handled seamlessly or whether there would be much chaos
as a result. The
concern was extensive and caused the Dot-com Crash of 2000-2001
as technology stock prices took a big hit.
As the year 2000 unfolded
however, nearly all of the computer systems performed as needed
and the worry proved to be unjustified.
While at Cindie’s we celebrated Karen’s 65th
birthday.
We further
celebrated it by getting her registered for Social Security and
for Medicare once we returned to Houston.
Our Quanex healthcare coverage, as with most business
healthcare plans, required employees and dependents to apply for
Medicare upon reaching the age of 65 as the corporate plan was a
Medicare supplement for those 65 and older.
Karen received only a modest amount of Social Security as
she worked only a few years and some of that was as the
proprietor of The Needleworks, in which she earned little in the
way of income.
The various acquisitions and divestitures and the strong
business environment in the late 1990s enabled Quanex to
significantly improve its operating and financial performance in
the late 1990s. The
financial performance in 1999 was four times better than the
prior year’s results.
Quanex seemed to be on a very strong footing and prepared
for the 21st century.
As we entered 2000 and my last year with Quanex, Vern and I
discussed Quanex’s future and any possible role I might have
with the company.
Vern wanted the board to extend my employment beyond my age 65,
however, the board was unwilling to make this change, despite
the growing recognition throughout corporate America that one’s
capability doesn’t cease at age 65.
Our family trip to Africa -
Karen and I planned a trip to Kenya and Tanzania, Africa with
our six grandsons and their parents.
We hosted the trip and paid for the air travel as well as
the A & K ten day tour.
We planned to do it in August to celebrate my 65th
birthday. Our
grandsons were ages 16 (Brad) to 8 (Adam) and we knew that each
of them would remember such a trip for their entire life.
We planned the trip using the experiences we had when
Karen and I visited this part of Africa in 1995.
We knew several places we wanted to go and several places
we would avoid. We
had a great experience with the earlier A & K trip and were
confident that we could put together a great trip for the twelve
of us using A & K.
We all flew on the same plane from Boston to London and laid
over about twelve hours in London.
With that much time in London, we took advantage of that
time and scheduled a tour of London’s top attractions during
this down time.
We organized a driving tour for the twelve of us to see
Buckingham Palace, the Tower and the Tower Bridge, Big Ben and
the Parliament Building, Westminster Abby and Hyde Park.
It was a quick glimpse of London’s attractions to
introduce the grandsons as to what to see in London.
The overnight flight to Nairobi got us there as the sun
came up. The A & K
guide met us at the airport.
A & K had transportation and help with our luggage and
immigration all arranged.
We checked into our hotel for a one day and over-night
stay. We left the
following morning and drove to Tanzania to begin our safari.
We left Nairobi in
three game viewing Toyota
vehicles. It
was about a two hour ride to the Kenya-Tanzania border, where we
easily passed through Tanzania immigration.
We drove to the Great Rift Valley, Arusha and Olduvai
Gorge for the first of our stops.
The Rift Valley runs from Asia to South Africa and has
resulted from two or three tectonic plates pulling apart and the
drop of the earth to the east of the rift of some 1000 feet in
some places.
Olduvai Gorge is the site that holds
the earliest evidence of the existence of human ancestors.
Paleoanthropologists have found hundreds of fossilized bones and
stone tools in the area dating back millions of years, leading
them to conclude that humans evolved in Africa.
Arusha is a game park on the eastern edge of the fault
which has wonderful game viewing.
We toured the park
in our three game viewing vehicles.
In the game parks where
we were observing animals the driver were required to stay
on the trails/roads
designated for animal viewing vehicles.
This limited our ability to get as close as we might have
otherwise to the rhinos and cape buffalo which were
close to the water. The roads were close to the water in
only a few places.
Each vehicle had a A & K
guide/driver who had a high powered rifle at his side. We saw
elephants, giraffes, wildebeests, lions all fairly close up and
numerous birds in Arusha, where we over-nighted in a lodge.
From
Arusha we drove to Ngorongoro Crater, which is the world’s
largest inactive, intact and unfilled caldera of an extinct
volcano.
The crater floor is some 100
square miles in area and is some 2000 feet below the rim.
On the way to the crater, we
drove through an area where there was a
large population of gorillas.
We observed them for a while
from a fairly close distance.
The gorillas like many of the
animals were reasonably comfortable with occupied vehicles such
as ours being fairly close to them.
We arrived at our destination
mid-afternoon. It was a very nice lodge on the rim of the crater
with a fantastic view of the crater.
The grandsons enjoyed the
swimming pool and we all relaxed before and after dinner.
We had a wonderful dinner and
spent much of the evening looking at the expansive area below
us.
Ngorongoro Crater
After breakfast we took a picnic
lunch and headed into the crater which had all of the “big 5” of
Africa’s game.
The crater was such that the
animals typically did not migrate out of the crater, instead
spending their entire life in the crater which contained a very
large but fairly shallow lake.
Once a road was constructed
from the rim to the crater floor the animals could of course
walk out but for some reason did not.
We did a driving tour of the
crater floor and saw all the big five on that day.
We did not get close
to the rhinoceros, cape
buffalo or leopards but were able to get quite close to the
lions and elephants.
The flamingos and other lake
birds populations were massive.
We had a wonderful day of game
and site seeing.
We returned to our lodge on
the rim for dinner and to prepare for the drive to the Serengeti
the next day.
The grandsons again enjoyed
the pool and dinner was wonderful, but the sunset was the best.
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From Within the Crater |
Another View From the Rim |
The next morning after breakfast we
packed a picnic lunch and left for our three days of game
viewing in the Serengeti. The animals were beginning to migrate
back from the Maasai-Mara in Kenya to the Serengeti National
Park. The Serengeti Plain located in both countries is some
12,000 square miles of grassland and feeding fields for the east
African animals which migrate from one country to the other.
The Great Migration is
the movement of a huge number of animals, including over 2
million wildebeest accompanied by large numbers of zebra, and
smaller numbers of Grant's gazelle, Thomson's gazelle, eland and
impala. Of course, the predators which feed on these animals
also migrate with the herds in this Great Migration. The
migration is basically driven by the rainy seasons in the
northern part and the southern part of the Serengeti Plain.
The animals follow the good grass. We drove most of the
day watching the migrating herds and looking specifically for
leopards which might be hunting for a meal however we did not
see a leopard.
We
saw immense quantities of wildebeests, zebras, and other
migrating animals as well as the other big five animals.
We arrived at our lodge which would be our base for the
next two nights and days.
We enjoyed fantastic game watching in this part of the
Serengeti the next two days.
On the third day we returned to the
Nairobi and over nighted in the same hotel as we had when we
first arrived in Nairobi.
The next morning, we boarded an old DC-3 to fly to the
Maasai-Mara. It was about a one-hour noisy flight.
We were met there by our guides and our vehicles.
They took us to a wonderful A & K camp, which included
sleeping tents placed on concrete bases.
Each tent had a sleeping area, a sitting area and a
dressing area. Close
to the back of the tent was an outdoor shower which consisted of
an over-head cannister of heated water for a gravity shower.
It was crude but a welcome relief after spending the day
in the dusty grasslands.
The grandsons soon made friends with a large wild boar
which seemed to be the lodge’s pet.
There was a relatively tall chain link fence enclosing
the campsite. During
the night we would hear the animals trumpeting, roaring, baying
or whatever. It was not conducive to sleep.
Particularly since many
of the animals were up early in the
morning. This camp
was a wonderful grassland venue and a great base from which to
do game drives. We
spent about one-half of a day visiting an authentic Maasai camp
site. We were hosted
by the village to whom A & K paid a fee for the privilege of
educating its tourists as to the ways of the Maasai.
We were well cared for in this A & K camp.
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A Toyota
Viewing Vehicle Like Ours |
Wildebeests
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The following
day we flew back to the Nairobi airport, boarded two small
private planes for a one-hour flight north of Nairobi to our
final camp on Kenya’s Lake
Naivasha.
We flew into a grass landing
strip which was the frequent grazing area of some of the wild
life.
The pilot radioed the lodge to
which we were traveling to meet the plane prior to the landing
and to clear the runway of any wildlife so the plane could
safely land.
We chose to fly to Lake
Naivasha to save almost
four hours driving from
Nairobi on a rough road.
We stayed at
a wonderful lodge over-looking this large fresh water lake on
the upper side of the Kenya portion of the Great Rift Valley.
The resort was about 100 yards
from the lake with a gradual sloping grassed lawn between the
lodge and the lake.
The
shallow portion of the lake
was home to many hippos that spent the day almost totally under
water-only their nostrils and eyes were typically above water.
Near dusk the hippos would
come out of the water to feed on the grass lands surrounding the
lake.
The first day we toured the
lake in small motor boats being careful not to hit any hippos,
which could easily flip a boat over.
The amount of birds on and
near the lake was immense. The adults other than Dave all took a
side trip the second evening we were at Lake Naivasha to a small
museum and gift shop.
Dave stayed at the lodge to
watch the boys.
The seven of them were playing
a board game at about
dusk, when Dave looked up and
saw a hippo heading for their location which was a picnic table
about 75 yards from the lake.
Dave and the boys all
scrambled away from where the hippo
was headed.
Fortunately, there were no
issues other than the scare.
It is not advisable to get
between a hippo and the water which is its home.
Of course,
Dave had no idea that the
hippo was where it was otherwise he and the boys would not have
been playing a game on that picnic table.
Regardless, we adults were
quite concerned about their safety once
we returned and heard about
their experience.
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Not
The Hippo That Chased Our Grandsons |
A Boat Driver Could Easily Miss This Guy |
We flew on the private planes back to Nairobi for our final
night in Africa. We
planned a dinner at a popular restaurant which featured meat
from each of several of Kenya’s wild game.
These animals were raised for meat by local farmers, but
we could order any of several animals which are also wild game
in east Africa. We celebrated my 65th birthday that
night. Cindie’s
family gave Karen and me a 2 feet by 3 feet map of Kenya with
hand written notes of thanks for the trip from each family
member. Kim’s family
gave us a companion map of Tanzania similarly notated.
We still have these two maps proudly displayed in the
elevator in our house now some 23 years later.
We returned from Nairobi on a flight that left Nairobi at
midnight and changed planes in Amsterdam that morning for our
flight to Boston and then on to DWF and Southlake.
It was a wonder family bonding trip.
Another new beginning –
I retired October 31th with a very nice retirement
party hosted by Quanex.
Division Presidents Bob Kelly, Jim Gulliford and Terry
Schroeder attended and said some very nice things about me.
Paul Giddens concluded the program with a proclamation as
a tribute to me.
Karen and I decided to stay in Texas through the end of 2000, as
my compensation was not taxed at the state level in Texas and I
was collecting some deferred compensation through the end of
2000. We made
arrangements to spend the balance of the year with Kim and Dave
in Southlake. We
also planned a nine country, 30,000 mile chartered airplane trip
through South America shortly after retiring.
Before that however, I registered for Social Security and
Medicare, as we wanted the healthcare coverage for our South
American trip.
I was not only paid competitively while working at Quanex, I
received annual bonuses as Quanex performed well financially
except for the unfortunately bad results from the acquisition of
the Dutch automotive airbag cannister manufacturer, which Quanex
wrote off in 1999.
Additionally, I was awarded options on some 50,000 shares of
Quanex stock which I exercised in the succeeding years (as the
options expired
five years after the award) all at a taxable profit
varying from $8 to $30/share.
My compensation with Quanex including bonuses and stock
option profits averaged about $600,000 annually – a substantial
portion of which I have given away as I have chosen to share my
good fortunate with worthy charities rather than spend it on
second homes, expensive toys or extensive travel and very
fortunately, since my two sons-in-law have both done better
financially than I have, my families have not needed the
financial support that many of today’s families need.
Retirement was not something that I looked forward to and not
something that I had well prepared to undertake.
Regardless, I was forced into it by company policy.
I had pursued possible board positions via search firms
with which I was acquainted, however landing such a position is
difficult and I was unsuccessful.
Financially, I did not need to work, but psychologically,
I thought that I did.
Click HERE to go to
Part XII
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