Bob Reynolds

AA in Journalism, San Jose City College (1972); self-taught in technology through decades of hands-on coverage and countless hours in garages with engineers who became billionaires

Married to Patricia ("Patty") for 48 years—she was an elementary school teacher who retired in 2015. They met at a church picnic in 1975; she was the first person he told about the Apple II before anyone else cared. Two adult children: daughter Karen (45, works in hospital administration in Phoenix) and son Michael (42, civil engineer in Seattle). Four grandchildren: Emma (12), twins Jake and Lily (9), and baby Owen (2). They FaceTime him weekly, which Patty handles because Bob still finds video calls awkward. The kids ask him to explain what Bitcoin is; he tells them it's complicated, which it isn't—he just doesn't want to say "mostly gambling." Patty worries he works too much, but after 48 years she's stopped trying to change him. They have coffee together every morning at 6am before he disappears into his office. It's their ritual.

Ham radio—licensed since 1968, callsign W6BHR. He talks to strangers around the world in the middle of the night while Patty sleeps. It's the original internet, he tells anyone who'll listen. Woodworking in his garage shop—makes cutting boards and small boxes that he gives away to family. The precision relaxes him. Reading history, especially military and industrial history. Currently working through a biography of Andrew Carnegie and finding uncomfortable parallels to modern tech barons. Maintains a vegetable garden that Patty says is too big for two people. He gives tomatoes to the neighbors. Attends local historical society meetings and has given talks about "Silicon Valley Before Silicon."

Keeps a Rolodex on his desk that he still uses—it contains contact information for people who've been dead for years, but he can't bring himself to throw away the cards. Has a flip phone as his primary device. Predates Teddy Ashworth's by decades—Bob started the trend without meaning to. He's not making a statement; he just doesn't need more than calls and texts. Types 90 WPM on a 1987 IBM Model M keyboard that sounds like a machine gun. He has three spares in the closet. Takes handwritten notes in reporter's notebooks he buys in bulk from the same supplier he's used since 1980. Still has the first computer he ever owned—an Apple II—in his garage. It still works. Gets up at 5am every day, including weekends. Old newspaperman hours. Can't break the habit, doesn't want to.

That the industry he's covered his whole life has become something he doesn't recognize—not the technology, but the values. The people in garages dreamed of changing the world. The people in glass towers dream of quarterly earnings. That young journalists don't understand they're being played by PR operations and "exclusive access." He's seen too many good reporters get captured. That his grandchildren will inherit a world where privacy no longer exists, where everything they do is tracked and monetized. He's seen how that system gets built, piece by piece. That Patty will outlive him and have to figure out all the technology stuff alone. He's written instructions, but he worries. That he'll be forgotten—not personally, but his work. That nobody will read the old clips that document how we got here.

To write a definitive oral history of Silicon Valley before everyone who was there dies. He's conducted over 200 interviews in the last five years. The book is half-written. To see one more honest-to-God innovation that actually helps people instead of extracting from them. He's holding out hope for medical AI, but he's been disappointed before. To be remembered as the reporter who got it right more often than he got it wrong. Not a cheerleader, not a doomer—just someone who told the truth as best he could. To watch the grandkids grow up. That's the main thing now.