Benlo Park

Are you the Peter Jennings I know?

Are you looking for me? Recently, it seems I have had a lot of people asking if I am the Peter Jennings they knew back when... I love the way Google has made it easy for old friends, colleagues and acquaintances to rediscover each other. If our paths crossed, I’d love to hear from you. Join me on Facebook or contact me directly.

Peter Jennings is not an uncommon name. There are 1,400,000 hits on Google, and most of them are not me. If you Google Peter Paragliding, though, you will find my Peter’s Paragliding Nomadness site in the top listings.

For the record, I am the Peter Jennings who:

• was born in Bedford, England, in 1950.
• went to Goldington Road School in Bedford in the 1950s.
• lived in Kirkland Lake, Ontario.
• lived in Welland, Ontario.
• lived in Niagara Falls, Ontario in the 1960s.
• went to John Marshall School in Niagara Falls.
• went to Princess Elizabeth School in Niagara Falls.
• built his first computer in 1961 using switches, relays and lights to do 4 bit arithmetic.
• went to A.N.Myer Secondary School in Niagara Falls from 1963 to 1968.
• interfaced a surplus Model 15 teletype to a homebrew computer in 1965 and programmed it to play chess openings.
• entered a lot of Niagara Regional Science Fairs.
• was a finalist at International Science Fairs and Canada-Wide Science Fairs in 1964,65,66,67 and 68.
• was licensed as VE3GEJ in 1965. When my dad was licensed in 1986, he took the same call.
• built a Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Spectrometer in his basement as a teenager, as one does.

• won a trip to represent Canada at the London International Youth Science Fortnight, 1968.
• studied Math, Physics, Fine Art, Philosophy and Psychology at McMaster University (1968-1971), where he lived in New House, Whidden Hall.
• was accepted into the PhD program in Physics at SUNY Stony Brook when he was 20.
• sold the Merit Student Encyclopedia door-to-door
as a summer job.
• received his MA in Physics when he left Stony Brook in 1972.
• married Jane Barley in St Catharines in 1973.
• received his MBA in Finance and Marketing from McMaster University in 1974.
• lived in Toronto, Ontario in the 1970s.
• worked in marketing and financial planning for Gulf Oil in Toronto, 1974-1975.
• worked with McKinsey to develop innovative marketing strategies - created the first Truck Stop.
• marketed financial planning software for Comshare in Toronto, 1976.
• was one of the first members and designed the logo for the International Society for Philosophical Enquiry (ISPE), The Thousand in 1976.
• a member of TRACE, the Toronto Region Association of Computer Enthusiasts.
• created and published Microchess, the first computer game product, 1976.

• shared a bed with Margot Kidder and Toller Cranston in Toronto.
• started Micro-Ware Limited in Toronto, the first PC software publisher, 1976.
• introduced engineers to microprocessors in a 3 day course that toured North America.
• created Micro-ADE, a 6502 development system.
• created the Commodore ChessMate, a handheld chess game.
• was challenged to a game of chess by Bobby Fischer. He won.
• created the Program Evaluation Analysis Computer (PEAC) for TVO and Children's Television Workshop in 1977.
• taught a weekly extra-curricular class for gifted high school students in Toronto
• designed a computerized security system for Bell South so they could hoard millions of old silver coins collected from their pay phones
• co-founded PEAC Inc in Toronto in 1978 to perform market research and audience testing of television programming and commercials.
• created the fantastick, an electric art sculpture, a 6 foot glowing coloured tube with an embedded 6502 that produced a dazzling light show.
• co-founded Personal Software which became VisiCorp.
• was involved in the creation of VisiCalc, the first spreadsheet program.
• lived in San Jose, California.
• created the Chess and Checkers cartridges for Radio Shack's CoCo computer in 1980.
• was an angel investor in a small Cupertino startup - which did quite well.
• lived in Los Gatos, California.

• created VisiDex, an early free-form keyword search based database for the Apple ][.
• invented a low cost software protection dongle for the inchoate IBM PC in 1980.
• exhibited a series of computer generated morphing images at SigGraph 1982.
• was a venture capitalist, founding partner in Associated Venture Investors (AVI).
• was a founder of Gavilan Computer, which created the first laptop.
• was Chairman of Vasona Corporation, creating software for the IBM PCjr.
• was a founder of Vivid Systems. Limelight was the first portable PC projector.
• invested in Starstruck, a private space venture, and helped launch the Dolphin hybrid rocket.
• invested in Personics Corporation, helping them develop the Head Mouse for the Macintosh in 1984.
• was invited to present at the first TED in 1984. He said no, and was never invited again.
• Extended MacForth 1.0 and implemented the help functionality for the language.
• sailed the Med on Tusom, an 8 meter Catalac catamaran.
• Published a flashcard program for the Macintosh in 1985
• created the Macintosh Word-a-Day program which was purchased by Disney.
• is amateur radio operator VE3SUN.

• invented and patented the MagicNotch audio filter.
• founded j.com in 1989 to market ham radio products - a too early dot com.
• created the freeware MagicKey DOS TSR program which had a large following in the DOS days.
• invented the Ventriloquist digital voice recorder.
• designed a VHF antenna that was tested on NASA Columbia shuttle mission STS-52.
• is on the air as AB6WM when he is in the United States.
• Founded Sunburst International LLC to develop a small subdivision in Branson, MO.
• created HamBase, the first electronic callbook, distributed on 29 floppy disks.
• started this web site in 1993 to distribute his freeware and shareware.
• is C31LJ, when he is at home in Andorra and was C31LHJ and C30LEV.
• co-authored the Pocket Guide to World History with Jane Jennings.
• wrote VisiDex, Pocket History and J Notes for the C-Pen.
• was a member of the V31DX DXpedition contest team.
• created Cachet, a Netscape browser add-on utility.
• wrote and continues to improve DX Monitor (1993-).
• was involved with Quantum Magnetics, developing NQR techniques for explosive detection. (Aquired by Invision).
• Assisted the Government of Andorra plan for a future in the Information Age.

• is the IARU International Beacon Project Coordinator.
• flew Schweizer sailplanes at Sky Sailing when it was still in Fremont, California.
• was a test pilot for Steve Snyder’s P-2 Paraplane in February 1983.
• has a passion for paragliding in exotic places.
• drives around Europe in his Romahome.

• spends as much time as he can in Andorra, and calls it home.
• belongs to the CIA. The Club International d’Andorra.
• is a member of the Unió de Radioaficionats Andorrans.
• is a member of the Andorra Computer Club.
• likes to take pictures for fun and profit.
• spends his summers on Fairy Lake Island on Stoney Lake.
• spends his winters in California.
• is a member of the Northern California Contest Club.
• is a member of the Contest Club Ontario.
• is an advisor to the Northern California DX Foundation.
• created the Slinger Slingbox Recorder and Viewer applications.
• is a docent at the Computer History Museum.
• is a life member of TechShop, where he likes to make things.
• created a profitable Twitter identity and trivia game web site and sold it in 2009.
• wrote several HTML5 webapps for the iPhone in 2009: Analog Scientific Calculator, Pocket History, Border Gas, Night Sky.
• enjoys finding a daily interesting factlet to tweet.
• still likes to play around with microprocessors.
• builds custom controllers and interfaces for the GoPro camera

There are lots of pictures in the Photo Albums.