Jim & Suzi Rego

Jim Rego was born in Pineville, Kentucky, the son of a career Air Force officer attached to the Strategic Air Command. As a boy, he moved with his family, never living in any one place too long. He followed his father's path into the Air Force as an enlisted man in the Tactical Air Command, ending up in Systems Command. "I went through two marriages before finding the love of my life," he says, looking at Suzi, whom he met in 1992 while singing  together in a Washington DC piano bar.

Jim was a pre-med student at the University of Kentucky in 1964 when he was drafted despite being married and a father. He immediately joined the Air Force, having passed his qualifications exams, and he chose electronics as his specialty and served a tour in Southeast Asia during the Viet Nam conflict as an electronic missile guidance and control specialist. His squadron was known as the 'MIG Killers.'

Jim posing with an electro optical guided bomb in Viet Nam

After Jim left the Air Force, he enrolled at Arizona State University, graduating in 1977 with a major in accounting. Eventually he returned to Kentucky for a job as assistant director of a company that provided programs for developmentally disabled adults. It was a residential campus where he was responsible for fiscal and operational activities and taught courses in fiscal management. "I was on call 24/7 and was the 'go-to' guy if there were problems," he says. While talking to a friend about his frustrations with the job, the friend suggested that Jim should go back to the Air Force. "I blew it off, saying I was too old and they were not likely to want me back." But he called the Air Force and not only did they want him back, they also gave him credit for his four years of enlisted time. "So, in my 30's," he says, "I reported for duty at the Officer's Candidate School at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas and soon found myself the oldest second lieutenant in the Air Force."

Upon graduation, Jim was assigned to the Space and Missile Center in Los Angeles and to his first project -- the Defense Meteorological Satellite program. A close friend advised him, "If you want to succeed in a military acquisition career, find something that nobody knows anything about and become an expert at it." "So I went to staff school to learn about a new hot button management concept called, Earned Value Management (EVM)," he says. "Nobody understood it and I seemed to be the only one knowledgeable about it. I rode that wave all the way up to the rank of Lt. Colonel and ended up teaching the concept at the Defense System Management College. 

"My career was basically spent going back and forth from LA to Washington DC, where I would kiss a ring, get my budget and go back to LA with another project. My last project before I retired was the Titan IV heavy lift booster program -- a response to the Challenger shuttle disaster in 1985. 

The Titan IV rocket, built by Lockheed Martin Space Systems, was the largest unmanned space booster used by the US Air Force. It was retired in 2005 due to its high cost of operation.

The Titan program eventually ended and the US currently has no program to build and support heavy lift rockets. Most of that work is parceled out to private firms, particularly to Russia, whose rockets are basically rented by the US for tasks like supply missions to the International Space Station and for putting heavy satellites into orbit. Several US defense contractors are jointly developing a heavy lift rocket program as a private venture and plan to sell space for government and commercial ventures.

"When I retired from the military," Jim says, "the job I enjoyed most was teaching and developing curriculum at the Defense Acquisitions University in San Diego. Just as the Air Force used simulators to train pilots, I believed that it should have something similar to train personnel who manage millions of dollars in projects, I took the EVM concept and developed a classroom simulator, which was well received. Also, I got my MBA in finance from the National University of San Diego while stationed in Los Angeles. As it turns out, I took up accounting as a second choice and it became the keystone of my professional career."

Jim and Suzi had been living on the West Coast since 1994 and Suzi, with children and grandchildren in the Boston area, wanted to move back east. Her son Chris mentioned Southport to her and she checked it out. "It was so beautiful when you drove through the gate, there were all these trees. It was lovely," she says. "Little did I think after we bought here that all the trees would be replaced by rows of condos." Jim never visited and they basically bought it online. 

Lt. Col. James Rego

In 2007 Jim started getting bad lab results on his kidneys and was diagnosed with polycystic kidney disease. He was in the hospital a lot and they thought that medical care would be better in the Boston area. The test results got progressively worse and in 2009 they contacted Mass General and Jim went into their kidney transplant program. He goes to dialysis for four hours three times a week and has added his name to the kidney transplant list in Vermont as well in Massachusetts. He's gone through five donors so far, all of whom have failed for one reason or another. So he is still waiting.

Jim loves golf and plays when his health and the weather permit. Suzi, too, is a competitive golfer and an active member of the Mashpee Women's Club, currently helping to plan a black tie gala to be held this September to benefit the Alzheimer's Society. They are a delightful couple, great neighbors and a wonderful addition to the Southport community.

If you know or hear of anyone who might be interested in donating a kidney, please contact Jim or Suzi at 508-477-9496. You can find more information on the kidney organ donor program at the Mass General Hospital website.