Bob Mullen
Bob Mullen was a computer designer, and a glass and ceramics engineer, and a good friend. To best describe Bob, I would merely suggest that you think of Friar Tuck of "Robin Hood" fame: "jovial, friendly, bald, not too tall, and he was well-fed". We had a very close relationship -- but NOT that like that (lol).
Bob and the Computer Swap meets
Bob was instrumental in running the Computer Swap meets at the Santa Clara Fairgrounds on Tully Road in San Jose. Bob, his son Dwayne, and I were solid fixtures of this event. (I have a really wonderful story about this event. E-mail me if you are interested.)
Mullen Computers - History
Bob Mullen owned a computer company called Mullen Computer Company[1] and was a well-known figure in the S-100 community. He actively participated in San Francisco area user group meetings and various magazines. However, as far as I know, he only produced two S-100 boards. An S-100 bus extender board and a relay control board. That said, the S-100 extender board was very popular and quite useful. If you were a serious S-100 computer hobbyist, you owned a Mullen Extender board.
I (Robin Roberts) worked at the Byte Shop on El Camino Real in Mountain View. Whenever a potential client wanted to purchase an S-100 computer, they would go to the Byte Shop and talk to me. We would first talk about "why" you wanted a personal computer so we could create a Bill of Materials of which modules you should purchase. We could discuss your level of electronic construction skills.
If the client so desired, I would outsource the assembly and testing of all components to Sigma Systems, a company I started in 1972 [2].
I would always put one of Bob's extension boards near the top of the Bill of Materials.
Bob and Dial Log
When it came time to put the Dial Log project together, Bob and I were the principals.
Sunday Brunches
While living on Wyandotte Street in Mountain View, we held brunches and "coffee-tea-or-me" meetings on Sunday afternoons. We had no specific agenda, and any topic was open to discussion. Almost all who attended were BDSM'ers, Vets, or computer geeks, so you get the idea.
One of our formats was the "What did you do in the war, daddy" munches. Bob and I were ex-Navy, as were many of the BackDrop members at that time. It seemed as though Backdrop was a cross between a bondage club, the Hollywood Canteen and the USO. It was pretty common for there to be a few sailors seen crashed somewhere at the clubhouse.
I am unsure why, but many meetings would have questions in the "how-do-you" format. Obviously someone would have to answer the question employing a demonstration. Well, you get the idea.
At one of our munches, we 'invented' the ICMBW. Imagine the concept of converting Winnebago RVs into launch platforms for Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles. The US government would loan these out to "Southern Gentlemen with far-right leanings' so they could go a-hunting. No country (Russia, etc.) would ever attack the USA knowing there were probable two- to five-thousand ICBMW's camped out in the Appalachians, each driven by a 'US Patriot' who had a case of Jack Daniels (and a case of Lazy Magnolia beer for chasers)?
Oh, by the way, it is only an urban legend/rumor that we would drive up to Lexington Reservoir on Sunday afternoons and demonstrate how to shatter boulders with explosives.
See also
References
A Personal Note from Robin
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