MIT Class of 1963, Class Notes for January 2005 issue of Technology Review
This time of year always brings a
lull in your submissions for the class notes column. Last weekend, with the
deadline rapidly approaching, I looked into my mailbag and found it absolutely
empty. Even the helpful editors of Technology Review who pass along Alumni Fund
envelope flaps with your notes, various news releases and obituaries, could
only supply me with two obituaries that I had already mentioned. What to do,
what to do? Fortunately my MIT
experience taught me to be resourceful. So, at a recent Orange County alumni
lunch I buttonholed *Steve Evans and asked him to write up something for
this space. I liked his response so much that in spite of telling Steve that he
was off the hook for a year I may ask him to write something every month!
So here's the note from Steve Evans, this month's class hero: "One of the pleasures of attending the monthly Orange County MIT lunch held at the University Club at UC Irvine is that our class secretary *Mike Bertin is a frequent attendee. Mike is pleasant, urbane and an inexhaustible source of MIT lore both present and past. The danger of seeing Mike on a regular basis, as he warned me when I started going to the lunches, is that you become an accessible source of material for his column. This month, Mike finally ran out of material from the class reunion and other sources. At that point he took on the aspects of an investigative reporter or a friendly but determined bulldog and informed me it was time for me to give him something for the class notes. My last submittal was so long ago that it escapes my memory (I'm sure I sent something once upon a time) so I now take keyboard in hand to do my part for our hard working class secretary.
I retired from Rocketdyne (originally a division of North American Aviation, then Rockwell and now Boeing) in 1997 after 32 years at what we fondly called the rocket factory. During that time Rocketdyne provided the liquid rocket engines for almost all U.S. Government and commercial launches including the Apollo program and the Space Shuttle. During the same period we developed the final stage for the Peacekeeper ICBM, the power system for the space station, and high energy lasers and kill vehicles for Star Wars. When I retired I was in charge of all technology programs and proposal operations. I served on a number of government-industry committees setting the direction of propulsion technology and was on the advisory board for the Propulsion Engineering Research Center at Penn State University. I have been gratified to see many of the technologies we were pursuing coming to fruition in current systems.
Since retiring, I teach short classes on Technical Marketing and Proposal Preparation, Proposal Writing, Source Selection and Business Acquisition and consult in those areas throughout the U.S. and internationally. Last spring I taught classes in Holland, Belgium and London in addition to a number of U.S. locations. My most interesting trip was a few years ago to the National Oil Company of Columbia in Barrancabermeija. That is the only trip on which I had armed escorts to and from the airport and it was pre- 9/11. I keep in close touch with many of my fellow rocket scientists including Dave Goracke (MIT 68), Ray Walsh (MIT 68) and Jim Glass (MIT 75). I stay current on the space program and have had a number of submittals published in the Op Ed section of Space News.
In 1999 we moved from West Hills in the San Fernando Valley to Foothill Ranch in Orange County to be closer to our grandsons the eldest now five and the identical twins going on four. My wife Sheila and I find our recuperation time on the days we baby-sit three active boys is significantly longer than when we were raising our two daughters. We also relocated our sailboat from Marina del Rey to Newport Beach. So far we enjoy the change of location despite having one of our new neighbors killed by a mountain lion when he went biking in the adjoining state park (lots of national news coverage). There are few places in the world to rival the climate of California well worth the hazards of earthquakes, fires, wildlife and desperate class secretaries.
Now that I have done my part for school and class I add my
plea for others to send information to Mike. He is a good guy and a real asset
to our class. Besides, he says I now have a free pass for at least a
year."
Steve, I couldn't have said it
better myself.
Regards to all. You can reach me at: Mike Bertin, 22 Gillman St, Irvine, CA 92612. E-mail: MCB1@aol.com. If you want to schmooze, call me at (949) 786-9450.