Ron Williams:
CLASS OF 1971
Dimond High SchoolClass of 1971
Anchorage, AK
University of Alaska Class of 1984
Fairbanks, AK
University of Alaska Class of 1976
Fairbanks, AK
Ron's Story
Since leaving DHS in '71, I spent all my time in Fairbanks until 1984, when I left Alaska. I got my BS in Physics in 1976 and married Kathryn in 1978. Divorced in 1981, MS Space Physics 1984. In between, I wasted what little smarts God gave me by not knowing I had any, but I did start a radio station with Rusty Walker and company KMPS, which is now KSUA, and doing rather well. I built a little company called Campus Disco that did dances and parties throughout the seventies. It was fun but got old after a while.
I moved to San Antonio, TX (yes, Texas) and worked at the Southwest Research Institute for a while. I even had a slight chance to go on the space shuttle until Challenger blew up. I did work for NASA on a bunch of their satellite data and wrote some elegant code to work on the space shuttle and the flight center in Houston.
I moved to Ft. Walton, FL, in 1989 and married a woman I met at Southwest Research Institute. She gave me my only daughter in July of 1990. The 8th of July will always be special.
All my work in Florida was classified for DoD, but I sure had fun until a presidential change caused everyone to panic, and they let people go left and right.
I ended up back in Texas. This time in the Dallas/Ft Worth area. I have been doing time here since...Expand for more
1993. I have worked for Texas Instruments, Mary Kay Cosmetics, Sprint, Sabre, and American Airlines. I was the chief technical architect for TopGolf. I still own the IP for the architecture.
I need to go home again. I did make it to Anchorage for the 45th anniversary of our Alaska Basketball Championship. The 76 team was there in force. We hope to do it again for the 50th and 45th, with more of the 71 teams present. Who knows when we will get together again?
I worked in Doha, Qatar, for a year starting May 2014. The world's most expensive hospital is in Doha. A simple 400-bed hospital with six MRIs at the cost of ~$4.2B (yes, billion)
I am now married to Stephanie Al Otaiba, Professor and Patsy and Ray Caldwell Centennial Chair in Teaching and Learning, Simmons School of Education and Human Development;
Southern Methodist University. Yeah, she is the smart one in the family.
I am semi-retired, consulting when I can, and working on several sci-fi novels. I hope to publish the first in a new series sometime in 2024. Keep your eyes out for "The Cycles of Hiraeth."
I became a grandfather on July 6, 2019. And again, on March 8, 2021, my grandson entered the world on my birthday. Her name is Harper Anne Lee, and he is Hudson Daniel Lee. I hope to meet them someday.
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