Clifford Holt Rylander:
CLASS OF 1964
Broadview High SchoolClass of 1964
Broadview, MT
Clifford's Story
Born: 31 October 1946 St. Vincent Hospital, Billings, Mt. approx 10:50 pm.
WHERE I AM TODAY:
I worked for the only schoolhouse in the world that teaches the skills necessary to end war on this planet. Our graduates TODAY! are in foreign countries teaching that we do not have to kill one another (Psychological Operations), how to live together peacefully (Civil Affairs), and how to protect yourself until you can get the first two in place (Special Forces). The US Army Special Operations Command (USASOC) is the best set of peace makers the world has ever encountered, yet few people know that our mission is to keep the peace.
My job was to ensure the availability of buildings needed by Army special operations forces (ARSOF) for home stationing, training and deploying to foreign countries. I used complex arithmetic and geometric models, similar to ones taught to me at Broadview Highschool, for estimating types of buildings and square footage needed. As the long range facilities planner for ARSOF, my contribution to the defense of America was both significant and very satisfying.
Since retirement in 2003, I do volunteer work for Patriot Outreach, an organization dedicated to helping service members come all the way home. Many of them cannort because of scars we cannot see. Most of us are combat veterans and we serve to make sure no one is left on the battlefield emotionally or spiritually. We are faith based but not religious. We who suffer know that the only way to make it off the battlefield is to reconnect with the faith that gave us strength in the first place. Being alone and separated from our moral base must be overcome and that can be done only through faith, family and friends.
Want to help us, visit our webpage: PatriotOutreach.org
HOW I GOT HERE:
After graduating as valedictorian from Broadview Highschool in June of 1964, I attended Montana State College (now MSU) at Bozeman. Beginning my studies as a nuclear physicist, and making six curriculum changes, graduation came in June of 1968 as a linguist with a BA degree in Modern Languages (Spanish). Military preparation with the Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC) was mandatory during 1964 and 1965. When ROTC became volunteer in 1966, I continued in the Special Forces battalion and graduated with honors receiving my commission as 2nd Lieutenant at Fort Lewis, Washington in August, 1968. Attendance at ROTC summer camp was delayed until my Senior year because during the summer of 1967 (when I should have been at camp) I attended the Army Military Academy at West Point. It never occurred to me when I accepted the appointment that it would be another four years (total of seven) to graduate with a Bachelor's degree. I chose to resign from the Academy and return to my ROTC training and receive my commission before my class of 1971, which did not have the opportunity to serve in Vietnam.
Two years of active duty military service sent me to Fort Benning, Georgia for six months basic officer training and then to Fort Dix, New Jersey as a basic training officer. Volunteering for Viet Nam resulted in seven months service with the 1st Infantry Division near Saigon followed by five months service with the 101st Airborne Division near the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) between North and South Viet Nam. Two years on active duty was enough.
During my time at Fort Benning, Georgia, I had met a beautiful young lady from Argentina with whom exchanged letters included poetry in Spanish and a proposal of marriage from the jungles of Viet Nam. Flying from Saigon, I arrived in Buenos Aires in early August of 1970 and we were married in her home town of Larroque on the 16th. Our first five years of married life were spent in search of a career that would support us and the three children that arrived during that time. Going back to MSU on the GI bill culminated in a 1974 graduation with a BS degree in commerce (which in effect was three as majors were awarded for marketing, personnel management, and accounting). From June to December of 1973, attendance at a college in Argentina contributed 36 business credits to this degree (in Spanish with a 2.97 avg).
Registered for a Masters Degree in Industrial & Management Engineering, funds were short in the spring of 1974 forcing the acceptance of job with the US Army as an accounting intern at the military depot in Sacramento, California. My thirty plus years of civil service were spent in this pattern of positions:
10/68 to 10/70 US Army Officer CONUS & Viet Nam
07/74 to 10/75 Accounting Intern, US Army Sacramento, CA
10/75 to 02/77 Systems Accountant, US Army New Cumberland, PA
02/77 to 02/79 Auditor, US Army Seoul, Korea
02/79 to 09/80 Accountant, USAF Space Command El Segundo, CA
09/80 to 02/82 Comptroller, US Army Community Pirmasens, Gy
02/82 to 03/84 Budget Analyst, US Army Europe Heidelberg, Gy
03/84 to 10/86 Program Analyst, US Army Europe Heidelberg, Gy
10/86 to 03/87 Information Mgr, US Army Europe Heidelberg, Gy
03/87 to 06/90 Facility Engr Comptroller, V Corps Frankfurt, Gy
06/90 to 10/92 Comptroller, US Army Spcl For Cmd Fort Bragg, NC
10/92 to 03/94 Information Mgr, USASOC Rsrc Mgt Fort Bragg, NC
03/94 to 02/96 Information Mgr, USASOC Civ Per Mgt Fort Bragg, NC
02/96 to 07/98 Information Mgr, JFKSWCS Dist Lrng Fort Bragg, NC
07/98 to 05/01 Long Range Planner, JFKSWCS Ops ...Expand for more
Fort Bragg, NC
05/01 to 12/03 Long Range Planner, USASOC Engrs Fort Bragg, NC
My department of Army civilian (DAC) career began as a GS-7 (equivalent to a 2nd LT) and progressed to a GS-13 (equivalent to a Lieutenant Colonel). It has been a life of exciting non sequiturs for a boring accountant career pattern:
As a systems accountant from 10/75-02/77 at the US Army International Logistics Command in New Cumberland, PA responsibility for accounting management of foreign military sales (weapons and munitions) to all Latin American countries was assigned to me because of my proficiency in Spanish. One Sunday afternoon, while working alone at the office, a call came from the gate guard that a visitor was on his way to my location in search of a status briefing on the accounts for his country. I spent an hour with Itzak Rabin (Israeli prime minister) before my boss could arrive and take over the briefing.
As an auditor from 02/77-02/79 at the Eighth Army headquarters in Seoul, Korea our President (Jimmy Carter) ordered the withdrawal of 28 units from the Korean peninsula. I had the responsibility for auditing the close out of their property books. As a result of the audits, over $13,000,000 of excess property (accumulated during nearly 30 years on the peninsula) was discovered and returned to the Army supply system.
As an operational accountant from 02/79-09/80 at the US Air Force Space Command in El Segundo, CA it was my responsibility to certify the funds used for all craft and equipment launched by the USA into space. This totaled $25 billion during my tenure. During this period, I also worked on a committee tasked with acquiring the first American space port under one roof. The launch, on-orbit flight and landing control system for space flight had grown over 25 years at nine dispersed locations. It was the committee's job to complete the first reiteration of that system at one location. It was my responsibility to identify and cost estimate all the required components. Falcon Air Force Base in Colorado exists because of my work to design the financial management system to procure and operate this space port.
Moving from budget analyst (fund request two to three years out) through program analyst (four to nine years out) and eventually program planner (ten to twenty years out) for the engineers at headquarters for the US Army in Europe, from 02/82-10/86, resulted in realization that the most important resource for any organization is its information. Jumping to the newly formed information manager position for the engineers, I was able to help bring the first local area network (LAN) for computers to the Army in Europe. During my tenure as information manager from 10/86-03/87 skill and focus on knowledge management became the central effort for the remainder of my civil service career. Although the job titles may not reflect any aspect of knowledge management, the goals and achievements for my work since the days in Heidelberg, Germany have centered on engineering processes, building information architectures and implementing automated decision support systems for organizations where I have been assigned.
In late 1999 my life with the beautiful Argentine lady came to a close, and she passed away soon after. My family has since enjoyed the addition of a North Carolina native American and her two daughters. Ours was the first wedding of the Millennium in North Carolina at one minute after midnight January 1st, 2000 and was on the local news reports at the time. It is a renewed pleasure to help in the education of a 21 year old and the up bringing of a 7 year old. Anticipation of these daughters becoming as cultured as the three Argentine-American children I helped to raise in Europe, keeps up my hopes for a longer life. Small note that when Betty Holt married me she wished to keep her family name and add mine to become Holt Rylander. My love for her is such that we both took that name to form our new family. Sadly, in 2010, my native beauty chose to obtain a divorce and move on to her fourth husband.
WHERE DO I GO FROM HERE?:
Since the days when I first became immersed in the education of my children, there has been the observation that people learn best when they can put the new information to practical use in a simulation-of or game-on the subject matter being addressed. Experience and skill gained during knowledge management assignments confirms the most effective way to learn is when a set of tasks is exercised repeatedly. This opens the future to creating computer games on subjects for which I have had successful experience. The majority of current video games are based on death, pillage and plunder. The mind builds decision patterns based on successful occurrences, which condemns current players to patterns that dull sensitivity to the suffering of targets destroyed to gain winning points.
My future is set on a path to establish a computer game development entity that will build its games on humanitarian and religious principles, thus giving alternative learning experiences based on civilized activity which builds rather destroys. These games will be known for their limited scope conflict resolution scenarios. The scenarios will be modular which can be combined interactively depending upon the users responses.
One of the most important skills necessary for game development is the ability to spin a tolerable yarn. Have you played any good books lately? This question is the opening logo for one of the most effective games I have recently reviewed.
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