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John Mitchell Class of 1967
John and his new best friend September 2004
Sue Everson (Sister of Mike Everson '67) John and Debbie Deck
Maxi and Pooky
Maxi is at the gate.... LOL
John Mitchell After High School I attended Miami-Dade
Jr. College for a couple of years. I majored in beer drinking, arguing with
professors, and assorted other Animal House activities. At 19, thanks to Renard
Cruz, I discovered computers and I was hooked. I enrolled in a Control Data
Programming Technology class and have been engrossed with the creation of
commercial business systems ever since. I worked for Deltona Corp and Real
Estate Data Inc. in Miami until 1975. In 1975, I was hired by Western Airlines
in Los Angeles. Western moved me to California and I lived in Manhattan
Beach California for 20 years. Unfortunately in 1976 my mother passed on and I
did not get back to Miami very much after that. At Western Airlines,
I met Brenda my current wife and the only woman with the patience to put up with
me for very long. Although I must admit Wende Fullerton had a huge impact on my
life and inspired me to become a better person (she doesn't know this).
When Western Airlines was bought by Delta Airlines in the early '80s, I went to
work for Continental Computer Services which became System One. Unfortunately,
System One was bought by EDS. Not wanting to move to Dallas, I accepted a
position at Isuzu Motors as Director of Applications development and stayed with
Isuzu until I left California in 1995 and moved to DALLAS Texas. This move was
predicated by my wife's wish to be closer to her parents in Arkansas. I could
resist corporate pressure but not the love of my life. After moving to Dallas I
was on a 3 year contract for systems development and legacy conversion with
Citizens Insurance in Detroit, Mi (actually Howell, Mi.). During this period I
commuted weekly from Dallas to Detroit. From that point, like most IT
Consultants, I have been involved in Y2K Legacy (gag me with a spoon)
remediation. I am now an independent Management and Project Management
Consultant here in Dallas. I last visited Miami in 1994. The old
neighborhood had changed quite a bit but, the old High School looked better than
I remembered. In the good old days I was always racing around the neighborhood
in whatever car was my flavor of the month. While I was in Miami, I did take the
opportunity to squeal my rental car's tires in front of the house where Debbie
Deck's parents used to live just for old times sake. Miami was a great place to
grow up. I have so many fond memories of the people from Southwest High, Riviera
Jr. High and Tropical Elementary. It is amazing, even though Miami was not a
small town, how so many of our lives were intertwined from Elementary school
through High school and beyond. I named a cat (which was my soul mate for almost
14 years in California) after one of James Cadwallader's high school
girlfriends. I can't tell the name or the secret password I use for everything
would be broken. I was surprised to hear that Charner "Denny" Skagseth
became a Green Beret. I would have guessed a Navy Seal, or, did he join the swim
team just to impress my sixth grade girlfriend Carol Evans. I guess we will
never know. And, my x-neighbor Debbie Deck, well it is good to read she is still
the same "Debbie Deck" unstoppable force. It was also good to read
that my old friends Chris Dobbins and Tom Bielecki are still kickin'. I would
love to hear from any of my old friends, unless I still owe you money. Ok, even
if I still owe you money, I would love to hear from you.
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