CNN iReport

This is a picture of me at age 5 years old.  Now, I am a CTO for a business law firm in Las Vegas.  I have an extensive IT background, but that is not my story.  The story here is about my mother and Step father.  My mother started as a punch card operator.  In fact, the first computer she operated is in the British museum.  The oldest in the world.  My mother would bring home work, and I would spend the time drawing pictures on the back of punch cards and playing with the 10 key machine.  Oh how I wished I had kept it, as it would have been a great souvenir of the past.  My mother was credited with setting up direct link between two mainframes, when Disk-to-Disk was the norm.  She was actually offered a high paying job, with a car, for the company that supported the mainframe at the time, but alas there was no daycare for me.  My stepfather was the Data Center Manager at the time and often took me on visits of the soccer field sized computer rooms.  Over time, I saw the soccer field reduced to a large changing room.  If there is anyone who has seen a change in Computer technology, it would be my mother.  She finally retired as a Data Preparation Manager, managing 30 data entry clerks preparing a payroll for the 30,000 employees of Cable and Wireless.   Today, she still enjoys tinkering with laptops, wireless AP's, and the internet.