It took me twenty years to find my career. I never did well in school. I just tried to get by, until I got to Tri-County Technical College. I had been in and out of different colleges for years since I graduated from Pendleton High in 1971, but when my wife became pregnant, money became a key factor in our decision making. I enrolled in Tri-County's Industrial Technology class where I found a teacher who believed in me and encouraged me to do my best.

I turned out to be one of the best students in the class, and the associate degree I earned at Tri-County in 1981 helped me move up from an assistant position on Clemson University's experimental beef farm to an associate position on Clemson's experimental fruit farm. I continued working on the fruit farm for ten years while I took agriculture classes at Clemson, but I was at an elementary school when I found my dream job.

Wildlife technicians are often asked to speak in schools about what we do. My wife's an educator, and one day I was visiting her at school when I saw a guy walk into the school with a turkey wing in his hand. My wife told me I ought to talk to him, which I did for a long time. He told me about his job as a biologist for the South Carolina Department of Natural Resources, and I started looking for openings right away. Jobs are pretty scarce in my field, but I managed to find one in the area. Now, I've been working for the Department of Natural Resources for eight years, and I use everything I've ever learned. In fact, right now I'm using the electronics training I got from Tri-County to install the electrical wiring for an equipment shed we're building on land donated by Clemson University.