Today I was looking through some old photos and came across a couple taken when I worked at a company named RDI. I started reminising and decided to document a little about that period of my life, the years I worked there, 1984 to 2001.
In 1984, I left what I thought, was a dead end job to move on to a company with better benefits. Little did I know that that company would grow and in 20 years I would have been the Exec VP and now would be President and running the place. I don't have any regrets though, everything I've been through has made me the person I am today and I ain't complaining one bit.
After I left, I went to work for a company in Melville, NY, named Radiation Dynamics Inc. (RDI) as an engineering aide in Research & Development. Here I am in 1989 cleaning up after working on what would become a 5-million volt electron beam accelerator. Up until then, the largest we made was a 4.5 million-volt accelerator that wasn't efficient enough to produce cost effective x-rays. It took a year or so, but eventually we were successful in developing a machine that would be commercially viable. This prototype went to a facility in Japan for further testing. That facility was owned by Sumitomo Heavy Industries, the third owner of RDI in the five years I'd been there.
I worked in R&D for seven years before I was told to transfer to Quality Control or quit. I chose to move. It seems one of the field engineers threatened to quit if they didn't transfer him to R&D, so move I did. The last laugh was on them, because he proved to be a waste because he was a drunk. Since he was usually on the road, they had no idea his drinking problem was that bad.
A few years later we'd out grown that building and moved to Heartland Industrial Park in Dear Park NY, which was about 20 minutes closer to home. Here I am with the president of our company and two executives from the home office.
See, I did have brown hair once. It's got a lot of white in it, but you can still tell.
A few years later Sumitomo sold us to another company, Ion Beam Applications (IBA) one of our biggest competitors. Almost immediately they fired all of our executives replaced them with our own and got rid of our sales staff. That was around 1999. Needless to say, sales of systems went to zero and to this day, the company hasn't sold one multi dollar system, just upgrades and repairs. I don't think anything more than a $100k or two. Business got worse and worse until IBA started layoffs in 2001. I didn’t know it at the time, but fortunately, I was the first go. At its peak, RDI had 120 employees and today not even 20.
For me, it was all for the best. I moved on to a much better position at Ultravolt Inc., the company I retired from in 2006 and that supported me more than generously during my wife’s illness.
In 1984, I left what I thought, was a dead end job to move on to a company with better benefits. Little did I know that that company would grow and in 20 years I would have been the Exec VP and now would be President and running the place. I don't have any regrets though, everything I've been through has made me the person I am today and I ain't complaining one bit.
After I left, I went to work for a company in Melville, NY, named Radiation Dynamics Inc. (RDI) as an engineering aide in Research & Development. Here I am in 1989 cleaning up after working on what would become a 5-million volt electron beam accelerator. Up until then, the largest we made was a 4.5 million-volt accelerator that wasn't efficient enough to produce cost effective x-rays. It took a year or so, but eventually we were successful in developing a machine that would be commercially viable. This prototype went to a facility in Japan for further testing. That facility was owned by Sumitomo Heavy Industries, the third owner of RDI in the five years I'd been there.
I worked in R&D for seven years before I was told to transfer to Quality Control or quit. I chose to move. It seems one of the field engineers threatened to quit if they didn't transfer him to R&D, so move I did. The last laugh was on them, because he proved to be a waste because he was a drunk. Since he was usually on the road, they had no idea his drinking problem was that bad.
A few years later we'd out grown that building and moved to Heartland Industrial Park in Dear Park NY, which was about 20 minutes closer to home. Here I am with the President of our company and two executives from the home office.
A few years later Sumitomo sold us to another company, Ion Beam Applications (IBA) one of our biggest competitors. Almost immediately they fired all of our executives replaced them with our own and got rid of our sales staff. That was around 1999. Needless to say, sales of systems went to zero and to this day, the company hasn't sold one multi dollar system, just upgrades and repairs. I don't think anything more than a $100k or two. Business got worse and worse until IBA started layoffs in 2001. I didn’t know it at the time, but fortunately, I was the first go. At its peak, RDI had 120 employees and today not even 20.
For me, it was all for the best. I moved on to a much better position at Ultravolt Inc., the company I retired from in 2006 and that supported me more than generously during my wife’s illness.
HAPPY BROWN HAIRED GUY FLASH BACK HNT!
I asked my assistant to make the drinks for the guests and heat up the grill for the chicken wings Lori marinated.
The grill was ready so I put the wings on.
While the wings cooked, I hung out with my assistant.
Then the rain moved in. Boy, did it rain and rain buckets and buckets.
Did the rain deter us?
