I promised Brian I would submit my boring history to the blog site so here goes.....
I was born when I was very young, the sun didn't shine, and I was raised in the canebrake by an ol' Mama lion...oh..wait..that's another story.
I was born in Berkeley, Feb. 5, 1946. My father was (soon to be) a jeweler in San Francisco and my mother was a sales person at Capwell's in El Cerrito. I had a very normal childhood. No medical problems (physically that is). Some might say I was a bit crazy, but, hey, aren't we all a little bit crazy? Anyway, good parents got me into St. Mary Madeleine's and there I received my first experience in parochial schools. I guess I did OK as I made it all eight years and graduated in 1960. On to St. Mary's. The most educational 4 years of my life as well as the most fun. We all know what all of us did at St. Mary's so I can skip over most of it. Suffice it to say it was a great four years and the memories will last forever and the lessons I learned there served me very well. I had several jobs during High School. Pharmacy delivery, detailer in a used car lot, etc.
OK, after successfully completing 4 glorious years at St. Mary's I found the freedom from mandatory attendance too much to pass up. So, my tenure at Oakland City College was short and sweet. I entered the working world with Standard Oil, working as an attendant at a station at Carlson Blvd. and Hwy 80 in Richmond. I even had a little white Chevron hat. Along about the spring of 1966, I was approached by my sister's former husband, and he asked if I would be interested in working with him on a summer job. It was to be a handy man at a Girl Scout camp north of Placerville. He had met my sister at a Girl Scout camp when she was a counselor, and he was a handy man, in the early 60's. They married, but it was short-lived. So, now he was going to work a summer gig at this new camp, and needed an assistant. Sounded good to me. I mean, really, two guys, and about 18 to 20 college-aged counselor gals, stuck in the woods, under the stars, etc. Yeah..I was all over it. I tended my resignation with Standard Oil (Later to become Chevron U.S.A.), and packed my bag for the piney woods of the California gold country. It was a great job and there was gold, "in them thar hills". Met some wonderful ladies, kept busy keeping the camp going and got paid for it. Somewhere in the middle of the summer, it was determined we needed additional help in the kitchen. My long time pal, Greg Schifsky, came up and finished the summer working in the mess hall. It was a summer to remember. All went well that summer of "66 aside from one little hitch...the draft board. They finally caught on to my not being in school, and my draft notice came in July of "66. I was able to finish the camp job, but had to report two days after camp closed to the Oakland Army induction center. Thus began my military career.
I reported to Oakland on Aug. 16, 1966. I avoided being sent to the Marine Corps, and was promptly put on a bus to that seaside resort near Monterey, Ft. Ord ! Now, this was not so bad. Ft. Ord has a decent weather pattern, and is in one of the most beautiful spots in California. We saw a lot of sand and bushes, and spent a good deal of our time down by the ocean firing our M-14's, the WOD (Weapon of the Day). I figured if I could get through 4 years at St. Mary's under the watchful eyes of the Christian Brothers, Basic Training and the Drill Instructor's (D.I.'s) would be a snap. Well, it was not a snap, but I was able to complete the 8 weeks. Looking back, probably the best 8 weeks I ever endured physically. One learns a lot of one's self in Basic. I have no doubt the discipline I learned at St. Mary's carried over into my military service. I completed Basic in Oct. of 1966. During basic, I was told I qualified for Officer's Candidate's School (OCS) never did find out just how I qualified, I think it was because I was a warm body. I said sure, I'll go. At the end of Basic I received orders for my next Advanced Training and it assigned me to a light vehicle drivers company. Cool, I was going to be a truck driver. However, those orders were rescinded since I was on the list for OCS. I was now to go to infantry for the next 8 weeks. I did not like the change and opted out of the OCS offer, but I still ended up in infantry - bye bye truck driver job. It was during that 2nd 8 weeks that they offered those of us who opted out of OCS a shot at Drill Sgt. school, which was on the Ft. Ord post. I did some checking and it turned out that if you passed D.I. School, you would be "stabilized" in a training center somewhere in the U.S. for at least 18 months. Now, I saw that as an opportunity stay Stateside for the length of my hitch ,(two years).I accepted the offer for D.I. School and I was assigned back to a Basic Training unit and worked there until I started my D.I. school. I finished D.I. school in June of 1967. I was assigned back to the unit where I had been working prior to D.I. school and finished my hitch there, never leaving Ft. Ord in two years. Thus, was my military career.
During that time in the service, I married my high school sweetheart, Barbara, not too long after I was in the Army. We lived off post in an apartment along with a bunch of other G.I.'s and their wives. Our son, James, was born in late November of 1967. We lived a happy life, me working at Ft. Ord and Barbara being a wife and mother. Upon my discharge in August of 1969, we moved back to the Bay Area. We found a good deal on a town house apartment complex in Richmond, near the El Cerrito border off Carlson Blvd. Yes, there I was again, back on Carlson Blvd (remember, I worked at the Standard Station only a few blocks away in 1965-66). Funny how things work out. We knew we did not want to live in Richmond, or the Bay Area for that matter. We were looking for a quieter place.
I had landed a job with Chevron U.S. A. as soon as I left the service which is why we started out in Richmond. I applied and was hired to be a tanker driver. Since the loading terminal was in Richmond, the Richmond apartment was handy, but not to our liking. As soon as we could, we began looking for homes outside of the Bay Area. We settled on Napa. It was still a relatively unknown area, not too far from our families but away from the congestion and confusion of the Bay Area. It was a 40 minute commute to work, so not all that bad. The only thing most people knew back then about Napa was it had a very well known mental hospital. Although a well known wine region at the time, the "wine craze" had not started quite yet. We moved to Napa in Sept. of 1969. Our daughter, Jennifer, was born April 22, 1970 at Queen of the Valley Hospital in Napa. And there we were, Dad, Mom, son, daughter, dog, cat, rabbits, rats, hamsters and whatever else critter found a nest in our home. I commuted to Richmond, drove tanker trucks, from the biggest Truck and Trailer rigs to the small bobtails, and dispatched trucks for Chevron from 1968 until 1977. I maintained a First Class license with Haz Mat, full truck and trailer endorsements until about 5 years ago. In 1977, I was then I was offered a job by the brand new Chevron distributor for the Bay Area. The distributor handled the smaller deliveries of Chevron products, things the Company would not do. I took that job as a Operations Manager and worked with that company from 1977 to 1995, going through 3 owners in the process. I had been driver, Opns. Mgr. Salesman, Sales Mgr. and the Division Mgr. for the company. In 1993, when the third owner took over, it was clear he was going to just peel all the accounts into his existing distributorship and close the doors of the company I was managing. He still kept most of us on, but in different capacities. After about a year and a half with the new owner, I opted to work for another distributor of Chevron products. I spent 3 years working for them as a reserve driver, mostly salesman and then inside to Customer service. In 1998 I went on my own and became an independent representative for a line of high quality lubricants, i.e., expensive oils with special performance additives. Thus was born that Mega-World Wide Consortium- Norcal Enterprises. Norcal had an employee list of one, me. But, I now had a name on the books.
Meanwhile,,,,backing up a bit..
My first marriage ended in 1994 and we parted on friendly terms. We are still on good terms to this day. She remarried as did I, but more about that later. The kids were grown and were making lives and families of their own. In 1996, Cameron James Stewart was born and I had my first grandchild. Olivia Diane Stewart was born, January 10, 2000, our own little Millennium baby. My daughter Jennifer married in 2003 and her husband, Bill, had a son from his first marriage, Corey, so I now had a third grandchild. Then, on August 18, 2004, Madison Marie was born to Jennifer and Billy. So, a grand total of four grandchildren.
OK, back to my fascinating work history....
As an independent rep, I worked out of my home and had a 6 county territory, all nearby. I had a lot of freedom, made my own schedule and traveled the six counties around Napa County. I was now single and living the bachelor life. Still in Napa, I had a great roommate who also used to work at the oil company with me. I was doing the independent oil rep job in 1999 when I happened to meet a lady from Sacramento. She was a Licensed Private Investigator. We started dating and I became very curious about her line of work. It was quite fascinating to say the least. We started working together on a few cases and turns out I was pretty good at it. We did witness interviews, pre-text work, research work, skip tracing (finding people who usually don't want to be found), surveillance and the works. I went for it like a hobo on a hot dog. Our relationship lasted about 18 months and we parted in late 2000. However, prior to our separating, she showed me how to get my foot in the door in Napa and said she would give me a referral if needed. I did some ground work in Napa, met a P.I. who needed some help and a friendship/partnership was born. I have been doing work for Greg Stuchman Forensics of Napa since 1999. I did a lot for him from 1999 to 2003 or so. It was then when his former assistant finished school and came back to work for Greg. I knew about all this when he hired me in 1999. I still did work for Greg and even obtained my Process Server's License in 2002. Then, in 2002, a new opportunity presented itself. I entered the Worker's Compensation investigation field.
It was all doing interviews of claimants who had come under suspicion for one reason or another. I was assigned to learn about the how, what, why, when, etc. of their claims. The company I worked for, Stewart Investigative Services (no relation) out of Rancho Cucamonga (yes, there is such a place) specialized in Worker's Comp cases. They had a complete team of surveillance guys as well as up front investigators (we called ourselves "interviewers", sounds less threatening) like myself. It was a good deal from 2002 to 2006. Got to travel all over the state, meet all kinds of, shall we say, "unusual" people and really liked it. The work got a little thin in 2006 due to some changes in the Worker's Comp laws. It was not to the employer's advantage to investigate claims as it had been in the past. It was easier to pay off the claimant now than fight them. So, that work sort of dried up. But between Stewart's, Stuchman and my own cases, I was doing fine.
Now, it had been about 10 years since I ended my first marriage and I was getting a little discouraged that I had not met someone I felt would be my new life partner. Then, along about April of 2003, I met Linda. She is one great lady. Sweet, smart and independent and a wonderful sense of humor. We hit if off pretty darn quick. We loved to travel, go to ball games, lounge on weekends, movies and all those things. We just went with the flow and it was a great feeling. We married on July 11, 2009 at Brix's Restaurant and Gardens north of Yountville. I have been one very happy camper ever since we met. Linda is still very active and is a business analyst and work various projects on a contract basis. When one ends, there are always more in the wings. We get to Hawaii about every other year. We have been to Italy twice, cruised the Mediterranean (twice) and cruised the Mexican Riviera. We love to go to Spring Training in Scottsdale and meet some S.F. Giants every year, fly to Vegas or drive to Tahoe or Reno, and all that kind of stuff. Before meeting Linda, I had been to England, Ireland and Scotland. Made several trips to Mexico, Cancun, Guaymas, Baja, Acapulco and some other places. I did a cruise up the inland passage to Alaska many years ago.
I mostly do just the court filing now. It's a great daily part-time job that gives me something to do. I still do work for Greg Stutchman and have also been doing occasional investigative work for the Napa County Public Defender's office. So, just enough work to keep me out of trouble. Linda and I are looking for a smaller place as this house is getting a little big for us. We have plans for Hawaii again this year and plans to travel even more in the years to come. Australia is on our "bucket list".
I have been to some great places over the years, however, there is still no place like the Napa Valley. For climate, convenience and comfort, there is no place like home. I moved here on a whim and have never regreted that decision.
That's a brief synopsis of my life. Not too exciting but not too boring either.
I will always attribute, to a great degree, whatever successes I had or have yet to accomplish to my years at St. Mary's. Even if I was not known for practicing discipline, I eventually understood what it meant and that served me very well all these days.
Thank you St. Mary's, faculty, administrative staff and fellow students, for helping me become what I am today.
Jim
Pictures: Linda and I with Family for our 5th Anniversary in 2009
