Michael Titford

b. 25 Mar 1945 m. 6 Dec 1976 Rebecca Thompson

I was born 25th March 1945, the youngest of three children of Elizabeth Teresa (Flach) and Maurice Edwin Titford, in Stoke Newington, London. In 1949 the family moved to South Croydon where I grew up and where I consider "home".

I developed an interest in science while in school and my career has always involved laboratory work, first in science and now in medicine (I was not "university material"!) In 1%9 upon completing my training in histotechnology, I thought a year or two overseas in the United States would be interesting and I have lived here ever since. America is an interesting place with something going on all the time! Never a dull moment!

My first year was spent in Boston in Massachusetts (Revolutionary war, "Yankees" !) followed by three years in the United States Army working in the electron microscopy laboratory at Brooke Army Medical Center in Texas (Cowboys, country and western music, rodeos). After the Army in 1973 I moved to Loma Linda in Southern California (Smog, earthquakes, freeways) for six years, again working in electron microscopy.

While in Texas I had met Rebecca Thompson and we decided to marry in 1975 and she joined me in California. Our first child Zachary was born in 1978.

About 1979 we decided to move to Alabama, where Rebecca had spent her childhood and where her parents live. Kathryn (Kate) was born in 1981 and Joshua in 1984.

I work at the University of South Alabama Medical Center where I am supervisor of the histology, histochemistry and electron microscopy laboratories. USAMC is a smaller teaching medical center that presents lots of professional opportunities. Rebecca is an Associate Director for Religious Education at the Archdiocese of Mobile - Office of Religious Education. Zachary attends Maryland Institute, College of Art in Baltimore, Kate attends Springhill College, the local Jesuit college near here in Mobile, while Joshua attends Fairhope High School and hopes to study music later.

I have always enjoyed hobbies. Photography while in Texas and California, and then collecting semi precious gems and minerals in the California deserts. I have now returned to stamp collecting, building on my childhood collection, and my mother's collection. I will talk about hobbies endlessly until I see the hearer's eyes glaze over!