Rex Bickers (FCHS ‘70),  Guest Contributor

As Veterans’ Day 2022 arrives, the opportunity to honor survivors from “the Greatest Generation” – – who were born between 1900 and 1925 – – is dwindling rapidly. In a similar fashion, isn’t it time to speak up for the “Silent Generation”? Those alumni (born between 1926 and 1945) formed the graduating classes from 1944 to 1963. They helped to lay many cornerstones of modern American life. The Silent Generation grew up, generally speaking, without television. And yet, electronics defined their youth nearly as much… based on radio. The 1948 yearbook (Vista) of NAHS contains this photo depicting the radio program “Hi-Time” produced by students, under the leadership of Assistant Principal, Mr. Marvin Oakes. One year later, an FCC license was granted, which created WNAS. It was the first high school radio station in America.

WNAS was born in what was still the heyday of vacuum tubes. Radio and the “new” solid state technology would go on to form the core of the “electronics revolution”. NAHS jumped to its cutting edge, introducing students to much more than just the broadcast booth. Sony’s transistor radio was introduced in 1957. By the 1958-1959 school year, electronics was offered as an option (to boys only) in “Industrial Arts” (usually called “shop class”) at NAHS.

Stanley Brown (NAHS ’62)

Guest co-contributor Shirley Brown Gordon, FCHS ‘78

Our story of Stanley Brown begins here. Ordinarily, the electronics choice would not have been offered to ninth-graders… but the class was not quite full and Stanley was allowed to take it. He would go on to take a class in electronics all four years of his high school education. It changed his life.

Faced with the likelihood of being drafted, Stanley enlisted in the Navy. There was a great need for radio and radar technicians, especially in naval aviation. For an entire year the Navy sent Stanley “to school”, preparing him for service on the USS Forrestal. A year in the Mediterranean was fairly easy. Then came the Western Pacific, assigned to “Yankee Station” in the South China Sea.

Stanley was aboard the USS Forrestal on that fateful day in July 1967 when fire broke out, killing 134 sailors (Captain John McCain was among the 161 who sustained burns or other injuries, but he quickly recovered).

The Forrestal came back to the US and remained in service for 26 more years. With his commitment to the Navy finished, Stanley was discharged in 1970… having served six years total (four on active duty, plus two inactive).

He soon found work as an electronics instructor with United Electronics Institute (also later named the National Education Center). He was initially based in Birmingham. Alabama, then relocated after 20 years to Miami. Just one year later, Hurricane Andrew turned that facility upside down and Stanley moved on. Through a program based in Tampa, he was able to earn a bachelor’s degree, enhancing his decades of experience. He joined Trak Microwave as an electronics technician, working on GPS satellite-based clocks and timing technology… systems used in classified space and military navigation, as well as in countless civilian applications. Another 20 years zoomed by and he retired in 2013.

Stanley has been married to the former Judy Woods (NAHS ’64) for 54 years. They hadn’t actually met until after he left the Navy – – even though they had gone to school together. The Browns have lived in Tampa since 1992. They have two grown children and one grandchild.

Update: Since the publishing of this article, Stanley’s wife Judy passed away on Sunday, September 14, 2025.

Ed Guilford (FCHS ’82)

Guest co-contributor Angela Guilford Sparks FCHS ‘86

There are many paths that lead from high school into military service. Only a few have what it takes to follow in Ed Guilford’s footsteps: start with high goals and excel at almost everything, often doing more than one thing at a time. Ed was an honors student at Floyd Central and he was active as a leader in CYO at his church. Awarded a four-year U.S. Army ROTC scholarship he attending Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology in Terre Haute. He earned a B.S. degree Mechanical Engineering) in 1986 and was commissioned a Second Lieutenant in the U.S. Army Reserves.

His career began in the Army National Guard as a Combat Engineer, but he quickly changed to Aviation. At the Army’s Fort Rucker in Alabama, he attended the Rotary Wing Flight School. He was an Honor Graduate and learned to pilot the Huey, Cobra, Apache, Kiowa and Blackhawk helicopters.

He has continuously combined engineering and helicopter aviation in private industry and in the National Guard. He rose to the rank of Lt. Colonel during an eleven-year span at the Indianapolis Naval Avionics Center. He held positions in Reliability Engineering and in Mechanical Stress Analysis. These experiences prepared him for a career change to jet engine design. In 1998, he was hired by General Electric and its affiliate ASE Technologies in Cincinnati, focused on Thermal Stress Analysis.

For the past 24 years. he has intermingled two worlds: deployments with the National Guard – – and at the same time, an ongoing rotation between employment at GE, as an analyst and design engineer… and full-time military service at Camp Atterbury. He has never stopped flying helicopters, participating in Instructor Pilot courses, training new pilots, learning new aircraft (which now includes the Lakota) and five major deployments: Bosnia (2004), Mississippi (after Hurricane Katrina), Kuwait and Iraq (2008), Arizona at the Mexican border (2018 and again in 2021-2022), In between, he took up new employment at Quest Defense, where he served as Team Leader for Thermal Analysis.

Somehow, time for family has been squeezed into the mix. Ed and his wife Karen have been married for 35 years. Their six children range from age 16 to 32. They live in the town of Guilford, Indiana where they are the only family with the same surname as the town.

Read the entire November 2022 Legacy Ledger (Issue 27).

Sharing is caring!