Tower Tales: Remembrances of a California Lifeguard (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9781500322427)

It was my honor and privilege to work for California State Parks for forty years. During my career with Parks, I spent seventeen years in the lifeguard series, gaining experience in every position from seasonal lifeguard to Aquatic Specialist, seventeen years in the ranger ranks, and six years as a Park Superintendent. As a seasonal lifeguard, I worked three summers as a tower guard and seven as a beach supervisor on the beaches of the San Diego Coast Area. In October of 1976 I became a permanent lifeguard for the Pendleton Coast District which included San Onofre, San Clemente, and Doheny State Beaches. During my four years at Pendleton Coast, I served as an instructor, and later the lead instructor, for State Parks' ocean and reservoir seasonal lifeguard training. In June of 1980, I left lifeguarding to work as a State Park Ranger at Cuyamaca Rancho State Park, a beautiful pine and oak woodland park located in the mountains east of San Diego. I returned to lifeguarding in 1984 to serve the Captain for San Diego Coast District Lifeguard Service. After three years at San Diego Coast I promoted to become the Chief Ranger for the Russian River District in Sonoma County. The District had a long history of having the deadliest and most treacherous coastline under State Park management, and was seeking a Chief Ranger with an aquatic safety background. Prior to my arrival, the District was experiencing six to ten visitor deaths a year, most of which were as a result of drowning. In 1990, I successfully budgeted for a small lifeguard force to address this critical public safety need. This was a "bare bones" force, no headquarters, no dispatch center, no towers, and no facilities, just a handful of highly skilled lifeguards using patrol vehicles and small, rigid-hull inflatable rescue boats to patrol over twenty-seven miles of rugged coastline. These lifeguards succeeded in cutting the visitor death rate to one to two a year, and in doing so became the most highly decorated lifeguard service for its size in the United States earning multiple Governor's Medals of Valor, USLA Medals of Valor, and the prestigious Coast Guard Silver Star. In June of 2006, I retired from California State Parks and moved to a small mountain town outside of Yosemite where I am enjoying hiking, writing, and traveling.