Principle – By doing your best, others will recognize and reward your efforts.

Music was motivation in its purest form to Quig.  He had a real love affair with great music.  As a college student he would sing at a downtown restaurant for his supper.  He was also keenly aware that he would not be afforded this privilege if his singing were not quality.  He had every intention of doing his best at singing.  To this end he took voice lessons seriously.  He had little money to devote to such efforts, none-the-less, Quig made room for lessons.  His lessons, practice, and dedication paid dividends to Quig throughout his life.  He performed in operas at college, community productions, and as a member of the world famous Mormon Tabernacle Choir.

Even in his later years, Quig was a faithful choir member and chorus member for community productions.  Everyone knew he did his best.  I recall Quig commenting that he sure couldn’t sing like he used to, but he would quickly add, “I do the best I can.”

This is one of those principles that came toward us kids in many, not so subtle disguises.  “I can’t is a slugger too lazy to try.”  “Any job worth doing is worth doing well.”  “We really don’t care what job you take, but do the best you can at it.”  “If you chose to be a tuba player, be the best you can be.”

These messages sank in deeply to me.  On graduation with my Bachelor’s Degree from Utah State University, the faculty at the College of Natural Resources voted me to receive the “Son of Paul Award” – as the outstanding senior.  Dean Thad Box in the award ceremony said, “The College will certainly be better off now that Tom is graduating.”  After the laughter died down a bit, he said, “That did not come out the way I meant it.  What I mean is Tom worked consistently to make the college a better place.  It was clear that he did his best to make the college a better place for everyone involved.”

This simple example is just one of many that demonstrate lessons taught and lessons learned among family members.  The key point is that words coupled with example can result in children understanding the principle of doing your best.

Quig cared about natural resources, no one could deny that.  Today many scientists are eager to point to the lack of frequent fire on the ground as a reason for larger and more severe fires today.  Quig was one of those in the Forest Service who caught the vision early.  Scipio, Utah sits in a beautify valley called Round Valley.  One late summer day lightning had ignited a fire in a juniper and sagebrush stand on the west end of Round Valley.  It was one of those rare days when a fire scientist says the conditions are perfect for a burn of the intensity that will yield favorable outcomes.  Humidity, wind, topography, and fuels came together to push the fire slowly across the landscape to the north away from residences and structures.  Quig found a vantage point that was also perfect to observe the fire as it did its magic.  It was burning in a mosaic pattern that would result in diversity, new forage for livestock and wildlife, and a reduced threat of future fire that might be heading toward town next time rather than away from town.  Quig radioed in that he was at the fire scene and all was well, no additional resources were needed.  After a couple of hours, Quig heard the drone of a distant airplane.  The plane was at a low altitude with the familiar painting of a Forest Service air tanker.  Sure enough the tanker let go his load directly at the heading fire, dashing Quig’s hopes of a larger benefit from the fire and perfect conditions.  Quig quickly got on the radio and was informed that because they had not heard from him for an hour, they assumed he wanted air tankers deployed.  Quig’s disappointment was shared with me many times through the years as he witnessed the scare of a fire force actions to contain even when conditions were perfect for allowing fire to play its beneficial role on the environment.  I suppose this demonstrates that there are times when we do our best, but the most favorable outcome might not result.

Many, maybe even most, school teachers amaze me by their dedication to do their best.  Audrey taught grade school for many years.  To get a concept or principle understood, she would spend hours at night often enlisting her children to create object lessons, displays, and handouts.  Each day and week created a new need.  In her effort to do her best, she would launch another venture to create new materials.  Her example seemed to stick with my sister, Roberta. Roberta, a kindergarten teacher, spends hours away from school preparing for classes.  Most of my colleagues in their professional lives spend far less time away from their appointed duty assignments working to achieve their professional goals.

Kerry has always had a spot in her heart for the medical career fields. She worked as a medical assistant for years and performed almost all functions in doctor’s offices.  I suppose it was that connection that resulted her being approached by our neighbor to see if she would take on the billing services for two anesthesiologists in La Grande.  Kerry decided to take it on.  This was at a time when desktop PCs were nearly non-existent.  The billing system consisted of a tray of cards with new entries entered by hand and photocopying was the means to send out the patient billings each month.  After several months of following this routine, I decided it would make her services more productive if we automated the billing process.  I purchased a computer that, at the time, was considered quite advanced.  The Intertec Data Systems Superbrain was a single unit with two floppy disks, a CPM operating system, and an integrated keyboard and CRT.  I purchased a relatively fast Texas Instruments dot matrix printer – the type that uses notched paper fed from beneath with form feeds.  I found what was supposed to be “state-of-the-art” software for doing accounts receivable.  It was written in CBASIC with the code provided if we needed to adapt it to work in the medical practice.  I did not know any programming languages but was convinced I could help Kerry meet her needs with this new setup.

Kerry spent the better part of two months getting all the accounts entered.  I tested the system with small runs of statements to validate it was ready to go.  The appointed day came to print the statements and get them out by Monday.  Friday morning Kerry called me at work to say the statements would not print.  I took the afternoon off to assist Kerry.  As luck would have it the software had a glitch of some kind. Calls to the software company were not returned.  I was on my own.  I started reading about CBASIC and printed out the routine that printed statements.  I worked for 36 hours straight before I was able to get the full suite of statements printed.  In that process I rewrote the look-up function that was used to find a patient’s record, link it with the records in the accounts receivable database, format the information, and print it on the forms.  In my regular job I had a computer programmer who worked for me doing database functions.  I showed him the code I had written and to my surprise he told me I had written the second fastest algorithm for a look-up function of that type.  It also happened to work flawlessly.  I always felt vindicated by that 36 hour sprint as a demonstration that I did my best.

I was not a great athlete in high school.  But in school with less than 300 students, I had plenty of opportunities to play sports.  My older brother, Lewis, was certainly more talented in sports than me.  I recall him setting up a makeshift moving target to practice throwing the football.  This rope, pulley, electric motor, tarp, and rag system ran many hours in our backyard as Lewis honed his timing, steps, and passes at the moving target.  I watched all this play out as Lewis was implementing “do your best.”  I also saw the direct connection as he was named to the All State Football Team.

At my first official track meet, I was to run the leg of a medley relay.  As my teammate yelled “go”, I took off like a shot.  When I turned to reach for the baton, my teammate and I failed to connect.  The baton fell to the ground as the other runners sped by; I reached down, picked up the baton, and made my way off the track.  Lewis ran over to me and said, “You never quit in the middle of a race. Even last place can make a difference in team standing.  It’s about more than you.  Come on do your best, that’s all we ask.”  Another lesson taught and learned.  I never quit midstream in anything after that, no matter how tough the situation.

As a scientist working for the Forest Service I had witnessed many riparian areas that were overgrazed.  The typical rationale that would be offered related to sacrificing some areas so that the cattle would graze further away from the riparian areas.  More and more fence was constructed to keep cattle away from the riparian areas.  It looked to me like the stream systems of the northwest were going to have a ribbon of fence along each side if an alternative were not introduced.  With this motivation, I came up with the idea that it might be possible to design an eartag for the cattle that would have a radio receiver in it that was sensitive to a remote transmitter in the riparian areas.  If the cow grazed too close to the radio transmitter in the riparian area, it would trigger a sequence of actions designed to get the cow to turn around and exit the riparian area.  This sequence would be a buzz, or sound, followed by an electrical stimulus if the animal persisted in the riparian area.  This way I envisioned that we could place remote transmitters in riparian areas and effectively exclude livestock without having to construct a fence.  I explained my grand plan to Jack Ward Thomas, my supervisor, who informed me, “That is such a great idea, give me six months and it will be my idea.”  I took that as a motivator to take action before the six months were up.  It took many long hours and much hard work, but doing my best paid off with the issuance of a patent for electronic livestock control.  A company has licensed the technology but has yet to bring the product fully to market.  I still think I did my best.

Bottom Line:  Sometimes the seemingly impossible really is impossible, but by always doing your best, you can accomplish what others might think is impossible.  You will receive recognition and rewards in return.