On Saturday I write fiction. I’ll keep doing it until I get it right (if ever!!!)
This is the sixth chapter in the life of Daniel Jackson. Daniel (now known as Dan) at age 14 in 1980 created a personal computer in his parent’s basement. Then he started to make some computers for neighbors, relatives, and friends. The demand for personal computers was phenomenal and soon Dan had employees in a small space at State Fair Insurance Headquarters in Bloomington Illinois. And, they were successful. So, Dan, Will (his father), Beth (his mother), and Steve (his uncle) created DJ Computers. And, now four years later, DJ Computers has 16% of the personal computer market - behind Dell, HP (Hewlett Packard), and just ahead of Gateway Computers.
Dan Jackson, now 18 years old, selected Purdue for his college experience. He wasn’t quite sure what his major would be, and in his first semester had University Physics (calculus-based), Calculus II, Freshman Composition, Introduction to Business, and MicroEconomics.
This week’s story comes after Thanksgiving 1984 after Dan has been home with his family and also visited DJ Computers.
*****
Will, Beth, and Dan Jackson made the two-and-one-half hour drive to West Lafayette and arrived about 12:00 p.m. on Sunday, November 25th. They stopped at Burger King for a quick lunch before leaving Dan for the last three weeks of his first semester at college, and Will and Beth returning to Bloomington.
*****
Dan Jackson was one of the first students back on the fourth floor. His RA (resident assistant) Tom Wolfe was already there with his door open. Tom’s room was across from the elevator so he could see people getting on and off the elevator.
Dan had one suitcase that was heavy. He had taken all of his dirty clothes home for Thanksgiving and his books (Calculus and Physics books were very heavy and expensive).
Tom Wolfe looked up and said “Hi Dan” as Dan got off the elevator. Dan answered back” Hi Tom”.
Tom got up from his desk and came to the hallway. “Did you have a good Thanksgiving?”
Dan laughed, “Yes, I think I found those ‘freshman fifteen’ that everybody talks about.”
Tom answered, “Only three weeks left in your first semester. Are you doing okay?”
Dan smiled, “Yes, other than freshman composition, I think I’m getting As”.
Tom replied, “Keep it up Dan. It's great having you on the floor”.
*****
Dan unloaded his suitcase in five minutes and then sat down to review his classes.
For calculus, he did every problem in every section for all lessons. He had bought a second Calculus II textbook and did every problem in that book too for the section they were working on. He wanted to be ready for the final test. Between now and the final, he would go back over each section and if he had time, would redo all the problems of both books.
He did the same with physics.
But, those were both classes that he liked and knew well. The freshman composition class was still a challenge. He had a standing appointment with Maria Perez at the composition tutoring room in Hicks Undergraduate Library. He had reasoned that if he could do every problem in calculus and physics, he could write (and write) and let Maria review his work. His professor, Dr. Augusta Nelson was a stickler for good grammar and quality communication. He had a rule from high school English class - that he needed to break - that is when in doubt, throw in a comma!! When he read his essays out loud if there was a natural pause, that must be the time for a comma. He loved his WordPerfect software on his DJ Computer as he could edit, add commas, remove commas, and even (gasp) add in a semi-colon.
The microeconomics class and the introduction to business class were largely lectures and he reviewed his lecture notes. In the textbooks for those courses, he read, highlighted, and took notes in the textbook too.
About every hour he would get up, and walk around the floor to clear his brain and get his blood moving. He also planned to run five miles every day, but occasionally he didn’t get all the way to five miles. There was a running track in France A. Cordova Recreational Sports Center - which was generally just known as “The Rec”. When it was rainy or snowing, Dan would go to the Rec and get his run in. It was ten laps to a mile and the running track looked down at basketball and volleyball courts so there was something to look at
*****
It was a great quiet and productive time for Dan. With his door closed, he concentrated on his studies. He was feeling pretty good when his roommate, Karl Sieverding arrived at about 4:30.
They talked for a few minutes as Karl unpacked his things. Both boys had taken summer clothes home and brought back more sweaters, sweatshirts, and coats. Karl had a good thanksgiving week back home in Muncie, Indiana. His family had visited some of his cousins and had a big feast near Fort Wayne in northeast Indiana.
About an hour later, the phone rang and Karl answered it. “It’s for you,” he said quietly. “I think it is Linda”.
“Hello,” said Linda, when Dan had gotten on the phone. “How was your break?”.
They talked for a few minutes and agreed to go to Laurel Hall for dinner.
“Karl, we’re going for dinner. Do you want to come along?”. Dan asked.
Karl said, “Not tonight. We stopped for lunch on the way and Mom sent me food for an army.”
Dan laughed. “I’m glad my Mom didn’t pack me food.”
*****
Dan met up with Linda Watson in the lobby of Hawkins Hall. Linda gave him a big hug and they locked lips for a minute.
Linda said, “I missed you, Dan”.
Dan agreed, “I missed you too, Linda.”
Dan grabbed Linda’s hand, and they headed out to Laurel Hall.
Linda was bubbly as they crossed to the cafeteria.
Dan asked, “How was your Thanksgiving?”
Linda started, “It was really great. Last weekend lots of my high school friends got together at the Huntington Recreation Center. It seemed like everybody was there. Most of them were off to college and were on break.”
Linda took the next four minutes to talk about her high school friends. Dan nodded his head as he listened to her. She mentioned about 15 of her friends from the choir, girls' volleyball, and classes. She knew where they were going to school, and what they were majoring in. To Dan, he figured Huntington was a smaller town than Bloomington and so Linda was closer to the other students. Dan hadn’t been involved much with school, other than cross-country. His business and entrepreneurial experience had been his high school interest.
They arrived at Laurel Hall Cafeteria and checked in and got dinner. Dan said “No Turkey” to the servers, and they laughed. Yes, many folks had their fill of turkey for a few days. He ended up with a Caesar Salad as he was thinking he could run tonight.
Sitting down Linda asked, “What did you do in high school, Dan?”
Dan answered, “I ran cross-country. That was my high school sport. I worked part-time at a job a lot.”
Linda nodded, “Did you need to work? I somehow thought your family had money - after all, your Mom is a professor, and your Dad is some kind of computer consultant.”
Dad smiled. Maybe it was time to spill the beans.
He started, “Linda, I was kind of an entrepreneur. I started my own business and then it just took over my life.”
Linda asked, “So that kept you from enjoying high school activities? That’s too bad.”
Dan nodded, “Yea, I guess it did.”
Linda then asked the big question. “So what business did you start?”
Dan didn’t answer for about a minute. “Have you heard of DJ Computers? I’m the DJ - Daniel Jackson who started DJ Computers.”
Linda was aghast. She was thinking “My boyfriend is Dan Jackson from DJ Computers? OH MY”!!!!!
Dan continued, “Please don’t share that. I guess I’m going to have to let it out soon. I wanted just to be an average guy going to classes, not the wunderkind of DJ Computers.”
Linda stared at Dan like she was seeing him for the first time - her eyes were wide open.
She started to open her mouth - but all that came out was “WOW”.
She recovered enough to start to kid Dan a little. “So did you fly back to school in your jet, or did your chauffeur drive over in your Lamborghini?”.
Dan had to laugh. “Nope, my folks - just common people - drove me over in Mom’s Astro Van. We stopped at Burger King for lunch before they returned to Bloomington. Yes, my Mom is a Physics professor, Dad is a computer operating system consultant. DJ Computers is run by my uncle Steve. And, I’m just a lowly college freshman at Purdue University”.
Linda was slowly adding it up. “So, Dr. Bunce knows your parents and knows that you are the Dan Jackson of DJ Computers.”
Dan, with a grin on his face, just nodded ‘yes’.
Linda continued, “So that day when he handed the test back he had figured out who you are?”
Dan, with an even bigger grin, nodded again.
“And you kept this from me?”
Dan finally talked. “Linda, I was at the right place at the right time, with the right parents, the right equipment, and more. It sure helps to have a physics teacher for a Mom who helped me get the components. Dad did the operating system (until we bought Microsoft MS-DOS licenses). It was fun assembling a computer in our basement. Then it took off - I made maybe ten computers in that first month; then with lots of help, we made fifty computers in the second month and by the third month, we were a company making computers.
“But it did mess up my high school activities. I got crazy and have had a counselor since 9th grade. Dad and Mom were cross-country runners and I needed someplace to get my mind clear - so running has been my thing. Uncle Steve had the business skills and brought together a great team. Last week, I attended a meeting of the various department leaders of DJ Computers- CEO, CFO, CIO, CMO, and other acronyms. I walked around the plant, seeing a few people I knew and a lot of people I didn’t know. No, I’m not your average boyfriend. I didn’t date anybody in high school and I’m pretty naive in the dating world. If you would have known that I was ‘that’ Dan Jackson of DJ Computers you might have freaked out on me - or tried to get money or whatever out of me. It is a delicate path.”
“And, again, don’t share this with anybody until I say you can. Not even your parents or roommate.”
Linda nodded and said, “Dan, I promise I won’t talk about this until you say so. My lips are sealed.” She made a motion of zipping her lips shut.
But, Linda added, “It is going to be hard not to talk. Let’s see, I’ll keep quiet if you give me a new DJ Computer!”
But, then she added, “No, I can do that. That would be great, but inappropriate for me!! “ She smiled and then added, “But, Dan, you know Christmas is coming”. She batted her eyes at Dan!! And Dan laughed back at her.
All of a sudden, Linda started to laugh so loud that other students in the cafeteria looked at her. “Oh My”, she said, and laughed again!!
Changing the topic, Dan said, “I ran in the Turkey Trot run on Thanksgiving Day. Several of my old high school cross-country friends were there. I came in about 250th place out of about 800 runners. I was running for fun and we were talking as we ran.”
Linda laughed at that. “Yes, you are quite the turkey!!”
For the rest of their dinner, they talked about the last three weeks and what they had to do. Like they had before, they both got a cup of coffee and continued to talk. Some of the other students joined them and they talked about their thanksgiving and the last three weeks of the semester.
*****
As they walked back to Hawkins Hall, the wind had changed and was blowing from the northwest. Linda said, “I saw on the weather channel that an early winter storm hit Minnesota and South Dakota yesterday and was headed this way.”
They kissed inside the door of Hawkins Hall to be out of the wind and then up to their respective floors.
Karl had the “Synchronicity” album by The Police on the record player as Dan walked back in. Dan really hadn’t listened to music as the founder of DJ Computers. He was too busy. But, Purdue had Amy Grant / Randy Stonehill performing on the 10th of December and Eddie Murphy in the spring semester. Karl seemed to be up on current music and had several albums.
*****
Monday, November 26 was a blustery day. There was snow throughout the day and the wind blew the snow into snow piles. Dan and Karl bundled up to get to Calculus at 8:00 that morning. By noon, the temperatures had dropped into the teens. At dinner, the weather was the main conversation in addition to studying and finishing the semester.
The professors were also pushing to get to the finish line for the semester. Dr. Augusta Nelson in Freshman Composition assigned a term paper for her class. Since Purdue was an engineering and technology college, the term paper was to be on technology for the future. The paper had to be specific - not just a “cars of the future” paper - but on some aspects of cars like improving gasoline mileage by 2010. Dan had struggled with Freshman Composition but with help from tutors he was at a B or B plus in the class. He wanted to finish strong.
The students had to have at least ten references and the papers were to be at least ten pages long and no longer than twenty pages. Walking back to Hawkings Hall, Dan was trying to think of a topic that would ‘wow’ Dr. Nelson and keep his grade up.
All that day, he was thinking of a “killer topic” that will keep him at a B or B+ grade.
*****
Two weeks before finals, Dan redoubled his efforts. He reread the textbooks for all his “easy” courses (that is all courses except English). He found similar textbooks in the library and read how those authors presented the material. He had a second calculus and physics textbook and did all the problem sets in both the assigned textbook and the purchased texts.
For the Introduction to Business, he created lists of the functions expected by the various departments and to help him do the analysis populated the lists with the corresponding executive from DJ Computers - CEO, COO, CTO, CMO, CFO. He listed Henry Mintzberg’s ten managerial roles and tried to picture Uncle Steve fulfilling each of those roles. He read W. Edwards Deming’s Fourteen points for management quality. He read Tom Peters and Robert H. Waterman Jr. best selling business book “In Search of Excellence”.
Dan adapted a severe schedule for these last two weeks before finals. For each of his five classes, he allocated an hour and one half each day for study. In addition to up to five hours in the classroom, plus two hours for eating and running, his day was laid out from waking to go back to sleep. He was watching his eating and was trying to avoid sugar and fats.
This was a challenge for Karl Sieverding, his roommate, and for Linda Watson, his girlfriend. The Purdue Basketball team under coach Gene Keady was expected to do well after winning the Big Ten championship in the 1982-1984 season but Dan had a priority other than going to basketball games.
*****
And, like a lightning strike, Dan had an idea for the final paper in freshman composition on the technology of the future. To him, computing was the future. And, part of that future was continued improvements in computing speed, storage, and communication. And, one of the main topics was “Moore’s Law”.
Moore’s Law had been promoted by Gordon Moore, the Chief Executive Officer of Intel Corporation. The concept was that approximately every year-and-one-half, the computing power of integrated circuits on computer chips doubled in speed and power. While only a hypothesis, for years it had been upheld.
For DJ Computers, Moore’s Law was profitable. The 3088 motherboards was replaced by the 3086 circuits, the 3088 was replaced by the 30186 (or ‘186), and that was replaced by the 30286 (or ‘286). The ‘486 circuit was an open secret to those in the computer field. For DJ Computers, each new circuit was faster, more powerful, and cost about the same as the previous circuit when it was introduced. So, the latest DJ Computer (based on the ‘386 chip) was twice as fast as the ‘286 chip, and users of the older computers begged for faster processors at the same price. It was kind of a “planned obsolescence” - where every 18 months the newer and better computers were replacing the previous generation.
Every office that was now dependent on computing and using Lotus 1-2-3 for spreadsheets and Word Perfect for Word Processing, faster processors justified the expense to replace the personal computer from two years ago. And, the older computers were handed down to other offices in companies.
If Dan could somehow get an interview with Gordon Moore, he might have an outstanding term paper - and he might slip into an A-minus grade. And, if anybody could get an interview with the CEO of Intel, it might be the founder of DJ Computers!
*****
Dan sat at his computer and wrote a simple outline for a paper on Moore’s Law. It would take a couple of paragraphs to give a brief history of computing - from vacuum tubes to transistors to integrated circuits and motherboards. Then a background on processing speed and Moore’s Law. If he could get an interview with Gordon Moore, that would go next. Then the future of computer chips. He could highlight how NASA put men on the moon with the technology of the 1960s. (He smiled to himself as he thought of how Purdue was sometimes called ‘the cradle of astronauts’ for the 27 astronauts who attended Purdue - including Neil Armstrong the first man on the moon).
He would then work on the technologies of the future, with expert systems, artificial intelligence, satellites, communication, cars and highways with computing powers, and more. His passion for Popular Electronics magazine would work well for predicting the future as well as working with some of the DJ Computer experts.
His next worry was how he could do that in twenty pages. He thought he might be able to squeeze in a few extra pages if the paper was as good as he thought it could be.
He wrote out some questions on what he would ask Gordon Moore if he could get an interview. He would also need to find every interview Gordon Moore had granted in the past five years to be on top of that subject.
Using WordPerfect, he wrote the following question:
How did you get interested in transistors?
How did Intel get to the stage of integrated transistors and then to very large integrated circuits?
What are the stumbling blocks to creating faster and faster-integrated circuits?
How are such circuits mass-produced?
How do you see such processors being used in the future?
As he was developing his list, he thought he could also talk to Purdue professors in the electronic engineering department. Dr. Bunce would know some of them.
*****
Dan laughed out loud and startled his roommate Karl. He was picturing himself on a podium accepting a Nobel Prize for the Best Paper by a Student in Freshman Composition class. He was standing in between Dr. Nelson, his English Professor, Dr. Bunce, his physics professor, Gordon Moore, and Neil Armstrong.
Karl looked over from his desk and asked “What are you laughing at?”
Dan smiled back and said, “I was picturing myself getting a Nobel Prize”. And at that even Karl laughed!!!
Karl added “I don’t think they have a Nobel Prize for the most hours studying for final test classification. Maybe you could get an entry in the Guinness Book of World Records.”
They both laughed at that.
*****
In ten minutes, Karl stood up and said I’m going to take a walk to clear my brain. Do you want to come along?”
Dan realized that things were dropping in place. “Go ahead, Karl. I’ve got an idea I want to pass on to my uncle Steve.”
Karl stepped out, wearing a coat, and Dan grabbed the room phone and called Steve Jackson, his uncle and the CEO of DJ Computers.
**********
That’s enough for this week.
So, next week we can anticipate that Dan Jackson finds a way to talk to Gordon Moore about Moore’s Law, he talks to Dr. Subramanian of the computer engineering department, and to Tomas Cortez from DJ Computers about the future of computers.
We’ll see how he does in his finals and move on into his second semester (will he come out to others about being Dan Jackson of DJ Computers?). Will the relationship between Dan and Linda survive? (Do I need another sexual encounter?) Will Dan Jackson get into the astronaut training program at Purdue? Will he drop out of college to run DJ Computers?
Will Dan discover that LOVE WINS? Will he learn that LOVE TRANSFORMS? And, will he know Karen Anne White has been writing about him? (It is fiction after all)!!
