I'm in my mid-sixties, married (for the second time), was born in St. Louis, Missouri, and have lived in the area most of my life. I currently live in Fenton, about 20 miles southwest of downtown St. Louis, where I work.
I'm an ex Federal civil servant (your tax dollars at work), formerly employed by the US Army Logistics Systems Support Center - a Central Systems Design Agency (software house) for the Army Materiel Command. More specifically, I was a computer programer/analyst team leader, and have been in the programing business for more than 45 years - all of it working for the government. I still work for the government, as a contractor, since they privatized our entire organization and I went to work for Computer Sciences Corporation (still doing my same job) in July, 2000.
A large portion of that 45+ years was spent on the 'net - I was involved with the ARPANet and the (lowercase) internet some years before there was an (uppercase) Internet. My first email address was zellich@office-1 - no domain name, just a host name! My early experience with the 'net was doing distributed design and development of a US Army office automation system using Doug Engelbart's NLS system. Later, my team replaced that system with a similar one based on Open Systems; I had the fun of writing a multi-media, hypertext, database similar to the NLS filesystem. While working on the second office automation system, I was also the Army Materiel Command's (and sole DoD) representative on IFIP Working Group 6.5 on Electronic Mail, were we created input to what later became the X.400 email specification. When AMC's support for the WG 6.5 efforts ended, we were beginning work on multi-media mail and interoperating world-wide nameserver issues and standards.
I have more hobbies and interests than I can participate in if I retire three times over. In no particular order, some of them are:
Science fiction and fantasy, including both attending, and running, SF conventions - especially see the Archon SF/fantasy convention, the St. Louis Science Fiction Society, and the list of St. Louis-area SF/fantasy clubs and conventions;
Reading - just about anything, although primarily SF these days because of the involvement with the SF community...I get more pointers to SF books than anything else;
Architecture and interior design;
Weapons and weapons collecting - all kinds, with a major emphasis on firearms and a minor emphasis on edged weapons;
Photography, including closeup model photography;
Model railroading, N and G scales, with a minor interest in railfanning and prototype railroading;
Cars & motorcycles - I've owned 3 motorcycles, and some of the more interesting cars I've owned have been a 1962 Triumph TR3, a 1960 Jaguar XK-150 fixed-head coupe (the XK-150 was the immediate predecessor of theXK-E), and a 1966 Cadillac limousine pickup truck nicknamed "Godzilla" (it was an unusual 4-door variation of what is commonly called a "flower car" in the funeral and limousine business); the most recently-purchased vehicles have been a black 2007 Silverado crew-cab pickup and a red 2008 Mazda Miata;
Model building - primarily plastic modeling - cars, planes, ships, space ships, etc. (also see "model railroading", above);
Space exploration, both near-Earth, and outer planets;
Movies and videos, including Anime' (my wife, Michelle, is the duck fan);
Rock and roll - classic 50's/60's/70's and heavy metal;
Dogs (I like cats and horses, too, but am basically a dog man);
Computer programming (I'm fortunate enough to really enjoy what I do for a living).
I belong to numerous organizations, many of them as a Life member; in no particular order, they are:
National Rifle Association (NRA)
Missouri Sport Shooting Association (MSSA)
Law Enforcement Alliance of America (LEAA)
Gateway Civil Liberties Alliance (GCLA)
Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (CCRKBA)
Unites States Concealed Carry Association (USCCA)
Single Action Shooting Society (SASS)
Colt Collectors Association (CCA)
Arnold Rifle & Pistol Club (Gateway Shootists)
National Active and Retired Federal Employees Assocation (NARFE)
National Model Railroad Association (NMRA)
NMRA Mid-Continent Region (Mid-CoR)
Missouri Pacific Historial Society (MPHS)
Terminal Railroad Assocation of St. Louis Historical & Technical Society (TRRA H&TS)
St. Louis Science Fiction Society (StLSFS)
Association of Science Fiction & Fantasy Artists (ASFA)
First Fandom (Affiliate Member)
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You can contact me at rich@zellich.com
Last update: Sat, 3 Jun 2023
"Rich Zellich" drawings © 1989 Dan Stratmann. All rights reserved.