What Bob Wright’s father handed him

Official Statements

• Naval Air Warfare Center Weapons Division, November 9: “In Colorado, a mechanic brought his young son to work and handed him part of an engine.

  "Here, tear this up," his father would say.

  The boy took it apart.

  He didn't always get it back together right.

  "I enjoyed working with my hands doing that stuff," he said.

  His family still knows him that way: the one who works with his hands.

  Today, Bob Wright works as an engineering technician with Seaborne Targets at Naval Air Warfare Center Weapons Division. He builds parts for the remote-control systems that let the Navy run boats with no one aboard.

  From his shop at Port Hueneme, he pointed at the boats in the lot outside.

  "Those are all targets," he said. "They're gonna be shot at, blown up, whatever."

  On Nov. 4, at Point Mugu, Wright received his 45-year Length-of-Service Award.

  "Well, it flew by fast," he said. "It's like the old saying, 'Time flies when you're having fun,' which is what it's been."

  His father taught him to take pride in his work. Learning something new kept him at it.

  Wright was born in Durango, Colorado. When he was about 10, his father's heart condition sent the family to Oxnard and its lower altitude.

  At Hueneme High School, he was a shot-putter, a big kid with a 12-pound metal ball in his hand.

  "I wasn't a speedster," he said.

  He took metal shop, woodshop and every mechanics class he could. College lasted a couple of months, but it was more books than hands-on work.

  So he joined the Army Reserve for machinist training at Aberdeen Proving Ground, Maryland.

  He spent 15 years with the 950th Maintenance Company in Van Nuys. Between drills, Wright made space shuttle parts at Abex Corp.'s Aerospace Division in Oxnard.

  "You may run 400 parts of the same thing for days," he said.

  A couple of his Reserve sergeants worked for the government, and they kept after him.

  "Yeah, you ought to go work for the government," they told him.

  After a few years of making identical parts, he listened.

  In June 1981, he started at the Construction Equipment Department at Port Hueneme.

  The job took him to Ronald Reagan's ranch to service the Secret Service vehicles. On rainy days, the Jeeps' narrow tires tore up the president's land. The president was not pleased. So the crew put on wide tires, almost like racing slicks.

  Those tore it up worse.

  So his crew changed those tires a handful of times.

  "And the money they spent on tires just to do that!" Wright said.

  At the department, he also worked on the lighter amphibious resupply cargo vehicle, or LARC. It carries supplies through the water and straight onto the beach.

  Wright changed the setup around its propeller to keep sand out, and the fix earned him a beneficial suggestion award.

  A green LARC still sits out front by the gas station at Naval Base Ventura County, Port Hueneme.

  "It looks like a boat, has wheels on it," he said.

  But the big one came at Point Mugu.

  In 1985, he moved to the machine shop there. It had its own sheet metal shop, tool-and-die shop, foundry and plating shop.

  "Anything that you can make could be completely done there from start to finish," he said.

  On a manual machine, Wright cut the curve of the shop's first fast-rope component, hardware for troops who slide down ropes from helicopters.

  Six months in, his supervisor took another job. The supervisor's boss knew Wright had led soldiers in the Reserve for five or six years and asked him to step up.

  "I have no problem with that," Wright told him.

  For the next 28 years, Wright ran that shop.

  Asked to name three highlights from his career, Wright started with that promotion.

  "Probably the topper would be becoming a foreman," he said.

  "If we can't make it here, it can't be made," he used to tell people.

  For a while, that was true.

  But over the years, cost studies led to staff cuts. Contractors in town took over work the shop once did. Fewer people meant too much space, so in the late 1990s, the shop moved into a smaller building.

  Wright remembered the downsizing as a low point in his career.

  When work slowed, the Seaborne Targets team at Port Hueneme borrowed him for a month. His boss asked if they had offered him a job yet.

  "They've been trying for three years," Wright said.

  "Well, don't let that place stop you," his boss told him.

  About six months later, in 2013, he took the job.

  "It was just like another section where I could learn more," he said.

  He learned to solder circuit boards by hand and to drive the target boats.

  And Wright especially enjoyed the travel. The job sent him to Okinawa, Guam, Norfolk and Kauai to upgrade the hardware on boats his team built.

  Back in the shop, Wright predrills and machines parts for the other technicians. His father's rule still shapes his days.

  "Take pride in your work," he said.

  Wright gives the same advice to his kids and grandkids and hopes the younger technicians pick it up as well.

  "But I learn a few things from the younger guys, too," he said.

  His 70th birthday is in January. He'd like to make it to 50 years of service.

  If he stopped learning something new or different, Wright said, "then that's the time to retire."