***Editor’s Note: The “I Became An Engineer” blog runs every Friday. To share your story email jennifer.delaosa@advantagemedia.com***
This week’s story comes to us from ECN reader Terry Zarnowski.
My interest in engineering began when I was around seven years old. My mother had bought me one of these watches featuring a teeter totter movement with gears you could see, through the clear faceplate, exactly like the one in the image below.
I was mesmerized by watching it operate, and after a few days decided that I must know how that watch works. So I carefully took it apart, laying out all the pieces as I went (as I learned from my father watching him take things apart).
Once I was satisfied that I knew how it worked, I proceeded to re-assemble it. Unfortunately, my mother caught me in the act, and began to scold me. During her scolding, she explained that the watch was very expensive and she struggled to save enough to buy it for me.
Of course I was fortunate that I was given such a generous gift. However, somewhere in the process, the parts became jumbled, and shamefully I was unable to get that watch to work again.
Looking back at my career, I feel that being an engineer was an enlightening experience. I wanted to know more about the process that watch went through from design to manufacture, and to understand why it was so expensive.
Soon after I found my passion with electricity and electronics, I had my first true and rather harsh experience with it. During some rough housing with one of my brothers, a light bulb was broken in one of those 1970s style floor to ceiling lights.
Being curious, I reached inside the shade to clear away the broken glass so I could see what was inside the bulb. Zap! After literally feeling the power (and some tingling fingers), I wanted to know more about electricity, how to control it, and to understand its applications.
The lightbulb and watch experiences instilled in me the desire to learn and apply an engineering approach to identifying and solving challenges. Over time I went from hard engineering in general automation equipment, to sales application engineering and eventually managing sales and engineering departments in imaging and packaging machinery.
Now I am currently Director of Business Development for a company developing new aircraft warning light products to keep our skies safe for air travelers, as well as manage our new initiative into providing Managed IoT Solutions. In this position, I am once again enjoying some true engineering R&D, prototyping, manufacturing, and bringing to market new and exciting products. I truly enjoy developing devices to control the awesome power of electricity to do useful things, and of course striving hard to not get zapped.
Read other stories, here:
- A Note From The Editor: An Engineer’s Story
- I Became An Engineer: Because Of MacGyver And Comfortable Clothes
- I Became An Engineer: Because Of A Small FM Radio
- I Became An Engineer: Because Of A Model Airplane Contest
- I Became An Engineer: Because I Loved LEGOs And Tinkertoys
- I Became An Engineer: Because Of A Magazine Ad
- I Became An Engineer: Because I Grew Up In Kenya
- I Became An Engineer: So I Wouldn’t Have To Go To Vietnam
- I Became An Engineer: By Just Being Myself
- I Became An Engineer: Because Of Sci-Fi Novels
- I Became An Engineer: Because My Dad Said Not To
- I Became An Engineer: Because I Couldn’t Stop Tinkering
- I Became An Engineer: Despite Being Bad At Math
- I Became An Engineer: Because Of Christmas Lights
- I Became An Engineer: Because Of Uncle Chet
- I Became An Engineer: Because Of Star Trek (Specifically Montgomery Scott)
- I Became An Engineer: But ‘Nobody Knows’ Why
- I Became An Engineer: Because I Couldn’t Be An Astronaut
- I Became An Engineer: Because Of Nuclear Submarines
- I Became An Engineer: Because No One Was Hiring Shoe Salesmen
- I Became An Engineer: Because Of A Book (And My Mom)
- I Became An Engineer: Because Of A Wise Father And The Possibility Of Death
- I Became An Engineer: Because Of An Evil Mastermind
