Jim Thompson wrote:
When I ran the Phoenix Analog Design Center for GenRad ...

GenRad. No kidding? I hadn't run into a GenRad guy for many years.
Back in '76, during college break, I interviewed for a temp. technician position
at GenRad in Concord, MA. The particular dept. developed bed-of-nails-type
board testers, the brains of which were PDP (8? 10? 11?) mini's. I was
impressed by the engineers, *very* intrigued by the work, and was quite keen to
get the job but ... some to-be college senior got it.

I wound up at Data Terminal Systems (point-of-sale terminals) in Maynard (home
of DEC, coincidently). Them thar new fangled cash registers used the PPS-4 chip
set. Very sexy. Much mo' better than a mini. :-)