Joseph Richardson - My Stay at the Lark Ellen Home for Boys - 1960-62 - Page 2

My College career would only last one year; again I would find 'extra-curricular' activities that would side track me from immediate goals. My roommate at the college was into cars and electronics. The allure of girls and cars - well I didn't study enough and lost my scholarship.

I was lucky enough to have met some people that worked for the Southern California Edison Company and because of them I applied and was hired into a program for training operators at their power generating stations in Sept of 1963. I took very well to the extensive training and the complex nature of the job. I would end up working at the Edison Company for 21 years, initially in operations but after Vietnam in the Engineering and Instrumentation Departments. The high paying and solid employment with Edison would prove to be another anchor that served me well with my lifetime flirting with disasters such as drugs. I managed to not get into any serious trouble and luckily survived some pretty crazy years. With my employer support I returned to college at nights and would eventually get a degree in Electronics.

In 1966 I was drafted - into the Marine Corps - another of those little bumps in the road my life has taken - 18 months and 23 days in Vietnam really messed with my head and when I returned to the states it was my job and the money that I would earn from it that kept me off the streets and falling into some really dark times.

In 1971 I met and courted a beautiful blond girl from Torrance California that would in 1972 become my wife. We had a son in 1977 and in 1980 would relocate from Hermosa and Redondo Beach where I had lived since going to work for Edison and move to Ventura California where we still live today.

During our lives we have traveled the United States and Baja Mexico a lot. I was a surfer kid for many years and then desert motorcycle and trucks for a while. Did a lot of surfing in Mexico and a lot of desert racing on my motorcycle. Because of my natural mechanical skills I was the tune-up or fix-it guy on a number of racers cars. I spent a lot of time at Lions Drag strip and at one point was the chief mechanic on a car that held the class record for B Stock, a 1964 GTO. We raced that car all over California in 64 and 65.

When we first moved to Ventura I took up the sport of roller-skating seriously. I competed in local, state and national levels of figure and dance skating and was very successful with the designing and building of props for skating shows. I competed for nearly 16 years and still have lots of good memories and friends from the sport. My son was nearly raised in the skating rink and he would become a pretty good hockey player before he gave up his skates.

For my many years at Edison I was a union steward and the results of my successfully supporting the workers with my union efforts I would never be seriously looked at for promotion to management, so, starting looking for other employment.