Unit by Unit
SELS NSSFC History 1950 to 1988
Kansas City Forecast Office 1950 - 1989
NSSFC SPECIAL REPORT
Frederick P. Ostby
Director, NSSFC
Prepared by:
E. Jane Parvin and Joseph G. Galway (Retired)
This is an important document that provides a chronology of SELS and NSSFC from 1950 through 1988. Jane Parvin, longtime NSSFC secretary/admin assistant and retired meteorologist Joe Galway teamed up on the project and worked for months to construct a chronology of the office's personnel, programs and significant events which include awards, changes in location and equipment changes. For each year there is a short narrative followed by a list of personnel who left the office in that year with a summary of their time in NSSFC.
If you passed through the Kansas City forecast office anytime from 1950 to 1988 your dossier will be in this document. It really was a great effort - a few copies are still around but for most of us - this will be the only way to view it again - after 20 years absence from the scene.
Hats off to Joe and Jane for their hard work and to Fred Ostby who initiated the project.
Click the highlighted title on the top line to download this doc in PDF format. The file is large, nearly 3 megabytes, so this will work best on a broadband connection. Once downloaded it should launch your onboard Adobe Acrobat reader and you can page through the doc's 134 pages one by one. The word search feature does not function with this particular doc.
Three additional thanks - to Steve Corfidi for providing me with a Xerox copy of his personal report and to Claudia McMullin and Bob Maxon of AWC for inviting me to make use of the scanner at the Aviation Weather Center.
Dick Williams
5 May 2008
Unit by Unit - Radu
Much as I'd like to write the RADU story - I don't know how. It was colorful, pioneering unit peopled by some colorful and pioneering people.
This is being done simply to show the way - a blank page awaiting the RADU story by not too many people who can write it first hand - that may be you Johnny Smith. Don Thomas. Who else and when. Entry via the forum or email to:
This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Unit by Unit - NAWAU- From the top
For now this is a sort of placeholder and sample article in a series I'd like to see repeated for all duty sections - From the Top is envisioned as a place for founders and early settlers to tell of the formation of a unit - describe how the unit came into being, the politics and sidebar stories of a unit's founding, the early players and the tools and challenges faced by the early crew. Many units won't have any remaining alumni but the hope is someone will be reasonably well veresed in the early work of the unit and can describe it at least back to the 60s or early 70s.
In short form - I was not a fouding member of NAWAU - that unit formed in late 1982 and began operations on November 10th, 1982 with a crew of 15 mets and Doug Mathews as supervisor. I was in Convective Sigmet at the time, served as one of the regional instructors for the classes that preceded launch of NAWAU and migrated over to NAWAU about six months into the program through a prisoner swap; Horace Hudson and I traded jobs interoffice.
More later. Trying to finish up the setup of the website for now so would rather get that task done and work on a FtT article a bit later.
Your contributions are awaited - you can enter them via the Forum category associated with the various units or you can email them to me via: rjw@selskc.netThis e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it
Dick Williams
12-31-06