Robert (Bob) Tilley:
CLASS OF 1969
Pompano Beach High SchoolClass of 1969
Pompano beach, FL
Seacrest High SchoolClass of 1969
Delray beach, FL
Belle Glade Junior High SchoolClass of 1966
Belle glade, FL
Delray Beach Elementary SchoolClass of 1961
Delray beach, FL
Boca Raton Elementary SchoolClass of 1961
Boca raton, FL
Robert (Bob)'s Story
Well, I keep putting this off! Don't know what to say!
Got married right after graduation, Still married to the same girl. We've had 44 kids, she's taken care of 45.(me) We tried 5 times to have kids, succeeded once. Her name is Kathy. We adopted my sister's son when she died. So when we moved to Albany, Ga and got a great big house and had no body to share it with, we fostered. Enjoyed the daylights out of that experience.;-) Found a job that made me happy, til management changed it.
After graduation, I went to BCC and tried to enroll in their flight school. It was in excess of $3,000 per quarter. I didn't have ten dollar let alone 3000 per. In 1970, I received a notice that started "Greetings", so I enlisted. I tried to get into the Air Forcce and Navy as a flyer, but I didn't have any college. The Army recruiter said "let me tell you how you do it" and I believed him.;-( Got sent to Viet Nam, had a good time on the beach. It was like S Fla, except for those 15 ft waves. I got to fly some but it was all unofficial. I was released from service at the same time as 100,000 other helicopter mechnics, so no jobs were available in that field. I gave up on flying and moved on.
Tried lawn service and pest control for a while but any retirement there seemed not going to happening there. Orkin had sent me to Albany, Ga ( anybody know where it is?) I didn't! When the company reorganized a manager with 14 yrs experience took my job. That's how I got on with P&G. I make Bounty and Charmin. Doesn't everybody say "I want to make toilet paper when I grow up?" But, I was programing the computers and troubleshooting the paper machine while doing elec...Expand for more
trical repairs. It was fun, challanging, and not repedative. But in the corporate world that doesn't count. You need to be able to show you are productive, not an expense.
With P&G not using my skills to their fullest, I was looking for SOMETHING else. My brother had this '69 Torino, I stole it. Spent a couple years rebuilding it and made peace with work. With that nearing an end I was thinking about what the next project would be. That is when I saw the Discovery channel program "A Plane is born". I said "I could do that." If I built the plane I would be able to do the repairs on it as well. I am a good mechanic! So I started looking at a plane I could build that would fit our lifestyle. We average 100,000 miles a year, so it was pretty obvious we needed a plane for cross country. One day while dreaming on the internet, Ruth came up behind me and said "No, 4 seats". Cause the plane most available were 2 seaters. That narrowed it down to about 3 or 4 planes. I liked the RV 10, but at the time there were NOT any flying, I needed more security than that.
So I decided on a Cozy Mk IV. It was a plans built plane, which means, when you can afford some more you buy what you need. The RV was a Kit, you would need to come up with a LOT of money up front. But the Cozy is fiberglass, I had done some surfboard repairs and some fiberglass work repairing cars. But nothing to this extreme. The plan start out with the easy stuff and as you learn it gets harder. There is also this wonderful crowd on the internet that wiil help at the drop of a hat. It's been a little over 4 years and I'm almost done.
That's my story, hope you enjoyed it, I have.
Bob
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