Grady, K6IXA, was first licensed in 1954 and has been actively involved in most aspects of amateur radio from CW to ATV. Grady retired in 1990 after 35 years with Pac Bell in a career involving radio, central office switching, data, teletype, microwave, PBX installation, repair, circuit design and provisioning.

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After retirement Grady became involved in running an automated Winlink 2000 mailbox operation. The need for this system was realized after manually handling Pactor Email on a cut-and-paste basis for the "Spirit of Grace," a Christian humanitarian freighter on its maiden voyage to Roatan, Honduras in 1997.

  Grady's computer set up.

Having previously served as volunteer radio office aboard the "Spirit of Grace" for Hurricane Mitch relief in 1999, Grady and his wife Ivy were asked to serve again on the ship for a relief run to Israel in 2002.

Grady and Ivy on the Spirit of Grace.

Retirement has been good for Grady. He says with several trips to Africa for Radio Missionary Email and serving on the Spirit of Grace it doesn’t get much better. Grady says each time he and Ivy go somewhere to serve they always come home bare-footed, having their "socks blessed off." With all his mission trips to Africa, Winlink and his Alaska-Pacific Net duties, as well as flying his Cessna 170, Grady has no problem keeping busy.