This blog is part of a series for Black History Month to celebrate and share the stories of Black American manufacturing leaders. I didn’t start out even remotely as part of the manufacturing ecosystem. I started my career at the nation’s first urban research park, the University City Science Center in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. I was trying to complete my doctorate at the University of Pennsylvania. I finished all my coursework but had not completed my Ph.D. dissertation. In hindsight, that wasn’t the failure many seemed to think. Going to work at the Science Center led to the kind of career