I wrote this for the “Work” section of my second website.
I’ve always had an interest in computing. My parents bought me my first computer when I was 10 (a Texas Instruments TI 99/4a, for those techies out there). They had high hopes that I would one day be a computer programmer. I, on the other hand, wanted to be an architect. I hated the command line interface and always found design and the use of type very interesting. You could say it was a small hobby of mine. I ran my own “graphics design” firm in high school doing odd jobs here and there.
Desktop publishing blew onto the scene right about the time I got my second Macintosh. As it grew and matured, so did I. Then along came this World Wide Web thing and it confused me. I didn’t understand it, but knew it was the future and needed to get versed in it.
About that time, I had stumbled into a job on Capitol Hill with the late Congressman Steve Schiff (a man I admire tremendously). He needed a web site, I wanted the experience, and the rest is history. My first (and his first) web site were…well…not so good. Everybody that saw it loved it, but as far as good web design goes, it was an atrocity.
Like desktop publishing, as the web grew, so did I. I eventually designed Schiff’s second generation site, an interim site for his successor, Congresswoman Heather Wilson, Sen. Pete Domenici’s second generation web site, Sen. Wayne Allard’s second generation web site and his second generation intranet and most recently have landed as the webmaster for the U.S. Senate. Since joining the U.S. Senate Sergeant at Arms as the webmaster, I have completed two web sites, the Senate’s administrative intranet and the Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies web site for the inauguration of George W. Bush.