20 years ago, Patrick Bolan (KJ7ZSU) was working as a construction manager for Home Depot, and saw his 1st mechanical Geochron in a conference room. 10 years later, he bought an old Geochron that – Patrick discovered – he could not repair.
He took the clock to the only place in the world that still made Geochrons… just a mile from his house. He felt a moment of destiny, and told the retiring owners, “If you were ever interested in selling his company, I’d like to be a part of that conversation.”
He couldn’t afford their price, but offered his own house as collateral to purchase Geochron’s tools and inventory.
Today, the mechanical clock is built and restored in Colorado, and Patrick manages the Geochron Atlas product he created from the Pacific Northwest with a small team of local developers. Every Atlas is kitted in his basement.
Patrick has a talent for persistence. He’s a 2x Ironman triathlete, 2 graduate degrees, married 30 years, and recently finished a 23,000 mile motorcycle tour to visit 48 Geochron owners in 48 states.
And he’d like to install a ham rig on his motorcycle someday.
CQ,CQ, CQ, Calling all hams! HELP NEEDED!
The new year is coming and as the Gold Coast Club reorders its Board of Directors and tries to rearrange it’s committees, we need to ask for more help. We have received excellent responses when we need volunteers to help with the physical set up of Field Days and Picnics and we are ever so grateful for the good response. Without the technical Team and its helpers, we could not provide a Field Day effort the size of that in the past. Thank you one and all.
Now, we have openings in the Food and Hospitality Services that is critical to the feeding of the volunteers and visitors to our club functions. I want to thank Gerald (Jerry) Deitch W4LST, for his continued support to GCARA and me in the past 10 years with Food shopping, storage and preparation. Although he is the President of the very active Parrot Club, he has not wavered in his volunteer efforts for GCARA in both the VE section and the Hospitality arena. He is a true treasure but he is retiring from this commitment in 2025. Jerry holds in storage, at his house, the coolers, paper products and things necessary to feed our populace at our gatherings. He shops with me, holds onto the groceries, keeping them in ice chests until delivery to the venue the next day. He helps set up and break down the Food area and takes all of the extra hospitality supplies back with him to his house. [] Now, new blood must take the reins. So, first, we need helpers in the Food and Hospitality Sector of the Club. The only person that is remaining on the committee is Mike Wolf KD4OVP who has graciously agreed to continue being the chef de jour at our events.
I also have things in my house, i.e. coolers, signs, Banners, supplies for Field Day events that I need to find a home for. As President for the GCARA for the last 11 years, I have taken the responsibility to store much of the club paperwork , some coolers and other supplies which I must find a home for. In the past, we have always relied on Kenny Hollenbeck KE4NC, Jerry Deitch, myself, Joe McGee NX4T, Ricky Eaton KD4HGR and Jeff Stahl K4BH for storage of club property. If there is a problem finding home storage for some of these items for the future, it may become necessary to incur the monthly expense of a Public Storage facility for the coming year. Please, if you think you can help us avoid this extra expense for the club, call Melanie at 954-560-3706 and let her know. Any and all help is appreciated.
In general, I would like to ask for help from many newer people to the club. It is necessary to “pass the torch” to the next group and if you can serve in any capacity to maintain our club activities, it would be incumbent upon you to do so. It is highly rewarding and lots of fun at the end of the day. Let’s see some of the GCARA spirit soar in 2025. Thank you for listening and more, for participating in 2025.
With love,
Melanie Fernandez KJ4VCT PRESIDENT 2024