Foster father of GPS
 

While writing an article for a "classic" column, I met an interesting
man who can be called the "foster father of GPS."

He is a retired USAF officer, as well as the owner of the boat I was
inspecting and photographing. While he was in the USAF, he was in
charge of "selling" the concept of a GPS satellite navigation system to
Congress. As he explained it, once the system had been invented and
tested no branch of the military wanted to fund it out of its own
budget. He was faced with the challenge of arranging cooperaton between
Congress and the various branches of the Defense Dept.

I think we're going to develop a "profile" story on this person within
the next few weeks, so I'll have permission to share more details. It's
always enlightening to realize that there are real people behind even
the most extraordinary inventions and creations, and that sometimes the
people who make something fiscally possible are as important in the
overall scheme as the people who conceived or invented the idea in the
first place.

Around 2/23/2005 8:52 PM, wrote:

and that sometimes the
people who make something fiscally possible are as important in the
overall scheme as the people who conceived or invented the idea in the
first place.

Oh, no... I'm guessing that this is going to be turned into another
"Gore said he invented the Internet!" thing. ;)


Good luck with the story; Sounds like it'll be an interesting read.


--
~/Garth - 1966 Glastron V-142 Skiflite: "Blue-Boat"
"There is nothing - absolutely nothing - half so much worth doing
as simply messing about in boats."
-Kenneth Grahame, The Wind in the Willows

On 23 Feb 2005 20:52:20 -0800, wrote:

While writing an article for a "classic" column, I met an interesting
man who can be called the "foster father of GPS."

He is a retired USAF officer, as well as the owner of the boat I was
inspecting and photographing. While he was in the USAF, he was in
charge of "selling" the concept of a GPS satellite navigation system to
Congress. As he explained it, once the system had been invented and
tested no branch of the military wanted to fund it out of its own
budget. He was faced with the challenge of arranging cooperaton between
Congress and the various branches of the Defense Dept.

I think we're going to develop a "profile" story on this person within
the next few weeks, so I'll have permission to share more details. It's
always enlightening to realize that there are real people behind even
the most extraordinary inventions and creations, and that sometimes the
people who make something fiscally possible are as important in the
overall scheme as the people who conceived or invented the idea in the
first place.

I can't wait to see it.

If only because I think I know him.

Later,

Tom

I can't wait to see it.

If only because I think I know him.


Later,


Tom


************

You might. Last name is Smith. Same guy?

On 24 Feb 2005 08:56:21 -0800, wrote:

I can't wait to see it.

If only because I think I know him.

You might. Last name is Smith. Same guy?

Perhaps not - I don't think it was Smith.

Later,

Tom

On 23 Feb 2005 20:52:20 -0800, wrote:

sometimes the
people who make something fiscally possible are as important in the
overall scheme as the people who conceived or invented the idea in the
first place.

================================

Very true. We had a guest on our boat last week who was one of the
developers of the VacuFlush marine head. The original plan was to
market it to Boeing for the 747 but it turned out that Boeing already
had their, uhhh, waste removal removal design pretty much set in
concrete, and not about to change.

Failing to interest Boeing in this modern marvel, they turned to the
marine market on the assumption that a system which used less H2O per
flush would also be slower to fill holding tanks.

wrote in message

........I met an interesting
man who can be called the "foster father of GPS."



There was an interesting squib (the 'Trailing Edge' column) in the MIT
Technology Review December '04 issue that may have referencd this person.
No Smith mentioned, though. :-) These two fellows cobbled up a quick unit
to receive the signals, factor in the doppler shift, and identify the
location of the transmitter - the satellite. Their boss said "Oh, that's
nice". A few months later he got back to them all torqued up (having
obviously mentioned this doohicky to someone), and asked them if they could
reverse the process -- receive the signals, and identify the location of the
receiver. Read it at

http://www.technologyreview.com/arti...ailing1204.asp

"Some Guy" wrote in message


.........These two fellows cobbled up a quick unit
to receive the signals, factor in the doppler shift, and identify the
location of the transmitter - the satellite.

Sorry, poor editing. Forgot to include the fact that this occurred
immediately after the launch of Sputnik.

On Fri, 25 Feb 2005 13:12:13 -0500, "Some Guy"
wrote:


"Some Guy" wrote in message


........These two fellows cobbled up a quick unit
to receive the signals, factor in the doppler shift, and identify the
location of the transmitter - the satellite.

Sorry, poor editing. Forgot to include the fact that this occurred
immediately after the launch of Sputnik.

My Dad was a ham since the early days of radio and was one of the
first to use directed signals for moon bounce at 144 MHz.

I grew up working with Doppler as a constant companion. Actually
sparked - no pun intended - my interested in CW and radio in general.

Later,

Tom

On Sun, 27 Feb 2005 07:49:46 -0500, " Tuuk"
wrote:

Yes, I work CW on 40m every day, then work voice on same band and 80m. A lot
of advancements in technology, internet, satellite, GPS or communications in
general were credited to hams.

I used to work the high speed nets on 75 every day, but most of the
old time high speed ops have dies off and those that are left are just
giving up and moving on.

Your in Region 2?

Later,

Tom

On Sun, 27 Feb 2005 08:34:01 -0500, " Tuuk"
wrote:

Yes it is tough to keep the hobby flowing. I enjoy the level of intellect
among a crowd that is identifiable. By knowing exactly who you are or where
you are brings out a higher level of integrity.
Newsgroups are fun to spot the morons, but for a higher level rag chewing it
is most definitely the amateur bands.
Interesting to see that you enjoy the moon bounce, a friend does that all
the time. Especially at this time and he is big with communications across
the Atlantic on 144. I am mostly HF.

Me too. If I manage to stray onto 10 meters, it would be a major
event. :)

Later,

Tom

On Sun, 27 Feb 2005 12:56:45 -0500, " Tuuk"
wrote:

Ya,,, 10 m been kinda quite lately around here, the dipole I am using now
doesn't really allow for efficient transmissions and I don't like putting
the old drake through all that. I am in the middle of building myself an all
band dipole. I started last August and had to put the project on hold for a
bit but should resurrect it some day, maybe this aft. Since I started that
project, I made a windom dipole for a friend and it works wonders on most
all bands.

I always made single band dipoles for my antenna farm, then again I
had the towers to hang them off of.

It wasn't until I met Lou Varney, G5RV of the G5RV multifreq dipole
fame and spent a couple of hours with him for a QSTinterview that I
built my first G5RV and used it in a CQ World Wide CW contest - all
the dipoles came down, I put up two G5RVs oriented NE/SW and NW/SE at
100 feet and used them for several years as an all purpose antenna. I
took tenth in the CQ WW one year QRP using only the G5s.

I worked 210 countries all band and DXCC on 20/30 and 75 QRP with
those dipoles.

Great antennas.

Later,

Tom

On Thu, 24 Feb 2005 22:32:56 -0500, Wayne.B
wrote:

On 23 Feb 2005 20:52:20 -0800, wrote:

sometimes the
people who make something fiscally possible are as important in the
overall scheme as the people who conceived or invented the idea in the
first place.

================================

Very true. We had a guest on our boat last week who was one of the
developers of the VacuFlush marine head. The original plan was to
market it to Boeing for the 747 but it turned out that Boeing already
had their, uhhh, waste removal removal design pretty much set in
concrete, and not about to change.

Failing to interest Boeing in this modern marvel, they turned to the
marine market on the assumption that a system which used less H2O per
flush would also be slower to fill holding tanks.

Yes, I was on the design team for Boeing as the Lead Systems Engineer.
I tried to get our head design to take off in the boating market, but
never succeded.