The Porter Drive Facility

This was the facility that preceded the move to 215 Moffett Park Drive in Sunnyvale.

Located in Palo Alto in the Stanford Industrial Park, off Page Mill Road and just a block or so away from Hewlett-Packard, this area was the very epicenter of early Silicon Valley.

Some free-associated memories:

  • Tony The Truck and his Roach Coach - coffee, donuts, and...
  • Coming in on weekends to use the WATS lines to make "free" long distance calls
  • First thing every morning - check the jury-rigged mouse-traps to see what the night had brought
  • System going down after every coffee break, because more that one toilet got flushed at a time causing loss of water-pressure (until the problem was isolated)
  • The VW van used by one denizen as his apartment in the back parking lot. (Don't bother knocking if...)
  • The Scottish denizen who drove either his Bentley (1953 R Type) or his new Lotus Super 7 to work every day
  • Another denizen whose scratching habit wore a hole in the crotch of the pants he wore to work every day
  • Stack processor, Janus, permanent files, TTY-Respond, and Scope 3.1.2
  • Dress codes, and somebody (!) arriving at work in the requisite tie - but little else
  • A well-lubricated anniversary lunch hosted by a former Marine, which got slightly out of hand as he returned to march his employees in formation through the building and up the stairs and...

Return to Home Page