James Brooks:
CLASS OF 1973
Wintersville High SchoolClass of 1973
Wintersville, OH
Clemson UniversityClass of 1984
Clemson, SC
Ohio State UniversityClass of 1978
Columbus, OH
James's Story
Grew up as a "typical" steel mill kid. Graduated WHS in 1973. Spent a year at Steubie U and graduated from Ohio State. Went to graduate school at Clemson University and wondered why the heck I did not start the education process in South Carolina....better weather and great accents. Oh well, we live and learn. Completed an M.S. and Ph.D. at Clemson.
Married college sweetheart (an awesome civil engineer and very tolerant spouse)...became a college professor at the University of Arkansas, where I was able to focus on research and minimize teaching (great job!)....Joined Ross Labs in Columbus... moved to Nestle R&D in Connecticut.....
On to northern California to manage the vegetable research centers and international vegetable seed company for Campbell Soup. Constant global travel with Campbell's, and, with agriculture, that means travel to those parts of the world which are largely remote, primitive and politically hostile...even more fun after 9/11/01..... did enjoy lecturing at universities in China, Thailand and Turkey.....Joined Syngenta to coordinate global agricultural research programs and get scientists to "play nice" at 16 facilities around the world (you think people in Steubenville have difficulties getting along?)...continued living in California and based in the Netherlands (what was I thinking??)....went to Eur...Expand for more
ope nearly every week, Asia twice a month, etc. etc.....many, many frequent flyer miles and skilled at not looking like an American......
Left the global road-warrior profession and moved to southern California to run the science and technology program for Pharmavite, manufacturer of NatureMade vitamins (entering year 14 of our planned 2 year stay in California)....
It has been and continues to be a great journey.....
along the way, I have accumulated two children (with aforementioned spouse), two dogs and two antique cars. With the amount of time that I spend away, I have been fortunate to have a tolerant family.
I am now reaching the age, where my oldest son is completing a computer engineering degree from Cal State-Northridge (December). My daughter has started her biomedical engineering degree at the University of California-Irvine. As we looked at universities in the midwest and east coast, it became woefully apparent that my daughter is a southern California girl, e.g. this child is stunned that there are places where it actually rains in the summer.......good grief!
After all these years, I still miss the pizza (DiCarlo's, Ray's, Giannamore's). The only places where the pizza comes close is Franco's in Inniskillen, Northern Ireland, U.K. and the Sofitel hotel restaurant bar in Dalat, Vietnam. That's it.
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