Tom Russotto
Uncle Bob had a large influence on my life. Like Bob, I was very interested in education and books. Bob's going to college was encouraging in and of itself but he had a more direct influence on me. He gave me three math books that he had used in college. He had purchased all three from other students and they were rather dated. One was on trigonometry, the second was on analytic geometry, and the third was on differential and integral calculus. I still have two of those books in a bookcase. My high school did have an introductory course in trigonometry but that was the most advanced course it had. I studied Bob's trig text in early in my junior year and the analytic geometry text late in my junior year while I was in the hospital after an appendectomy. I started studying the calculus text while our family spent a cold and rainy stay at a Jersey island. Grandma was with us on the stay and I got to know a little about her on that trip. Although I lazed through my senior year, my math knowledge enabled me to get into Stevens Institute of Technology with a full scholarship. Uncle Bob changed my life for the better with those texts.
I didn't see Bob very often. He lived in Indonesia and California but I do recall seeing him once in Delair when we both visited at the same time. I often traveled to California for work and Bob had let me know I could visit any time. I took him up on his offer once or twice and met his family. I just dropped in one Saturday and was invited to spend the weekend. He took us to a beach, I think Half Moon Bay. His home was equipped with a microwave and it may have been the first time I'd used one. He was working for Fairchild Camera at the time and gave me a wafer of microcircuits, new at the time. I kept that wafer for many years but I don't seem to have it any more. Bob surprised me by saying he was jealous of all the travel I was able to do. I'm glad that he was able to satisfy his desire to travel.
As anyone reading this wall knows, Bob was a fine man. I learned from him and admired him. His development of the genealogy spreadsheet was a gift to us all. The world his better for his time in it.