Profile: Jim Powell

Personal background
I was born in Oklahoma into a proud Cherokee family. Being raised in a small town in that part of the state has its advantages, and Adair was a very small town. Good schools, a lake within 20 miles no matter which road you took out of town, and the general small town attitude. I attended that one school from Kindergarten through 12th grade. While there, I earned an Eagle Scout award and began coaching for Special Olympics. I continued to coach the local Special Olympics participants until I graduated College. I found this work to be very rewarding personally, along with my responsibilities as an Assistant Scout Master, I felt I gave a lot back to my community, and of course they supported me as well. One good example of this was graduation from Northeastern State University in Tahlequah, OK. The Scout Troop and town in general rented a couple of busses and I was well represented at the ceremony. Upon completion of college I moved to California to begin work. I worked on many projects right away. My first was in the Oxnard Area where I worked for the Navy, then I moved to the Las Vegas Area for a while where I worked for the Air Force, then back to Ridgecrest, which is where I’ve been since 1988. This is a Navy town. Ridgecrest exists to support the base at China Lake, and no there is no water there either. Since I have been employed by the US Military, I’ve worked on submarines, aircraft and RADAR, both ours and foreign. It has been quite an adventure, with some being more open than others. I’m currently assigned to the Weapons Integration Group for the AV-8B Harrier. This aircraft is a very interesting assignment. We spend the bulk of our time trying to put new weapons on an old aircraft. Keeps work quite interesting. For an individual who graduated with a degree in computer science as his primary major, I spend little to no time doing software on an average week. The bulk of my time is with my secondary major Electrical Engineering. Beyond work, there are few things to tell. I am recently divorced; actually the last court date was the date of this paper. I just bought a house where I live with my three dogs, cockatoo and chinchilla. So as you can tell, my life is not that exciting at this time, but I enjoy it.
Thoughts about SETI and SETI@home
SETI@home has always been a fascinating project for me. As I've always been of the opinion that with all the stars that are out there, and all the planets that surround them, I just can't see us being alone in the Universe.
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