Sometimes I think that my life has been like a Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn novel (and it’s not over yet)!
I was born in El Centro, California, about 100 miles east of San Diego, where my family moved when I was about seven years old. My dad had bought Acme Printing Co., one of the oldest printing firms here in San Diego, dating back to around 1905 or earlier. After graduating from high school and volunteering for the draft, I was offered a chance to take my choice of any school the Army had to offer, so looking for the big bucks ($55.00 extra per month) I chose the Army Airborne. I don't recommend jumping out of a perfectly good airplane.
With my Honorable discharge from the Army in 1956, and the offer to pay me to go back to school, I was able to get my commercial pilot's license, and look for a job with the airlines here in San Diego. But no luck here, all of the pilots coming home from Korea got the jobs. Joining my Farther, I managed the family printing business. I met my lovely wife, got married and had five children. I attended San Diego Junior College, and San Diego State College (it was not even a University in those days), taking classes in business and marketing. After my father's death I owned Acme Printing Co. and other various business enterprises for over twenty years.
I was very active in San Diego, joining various Civic organizations; San Diego Junior Chamber of Commerce, past chairman of the Aviation Committee, I formed the San Diego Jaycee Flying Club, Past President of Harbor Lions, Flotilla 11, U.S. Coast Guard Power Squadron Air Search and Rescue, Antique Air Craft Association, San Diego Aerospace Museum, and was a member of the San Diego Elks Lodge. Busy, busy, busy!
I started various companies in the twenty years I was active in the printing business. American Traders Manufactures and Buyers (ATMAB - Anything To Make A Buck), Presto Prints of California, The Sand Box, Tattoos by Joyce, Joyce Enterprises Inc., M&J Marketing, Marshall Air, San Diego Sky Hawks Inc. and Typro Graphics. I retired from the printing business in 1976, and formed Joyce Enterprises Inc., a corporation involved in marketing and business consulting; I was a major shareholder and served on the Board of Directors as Vice President in charge of marketing, and product development. After a while I decreased my workweek, and basically retired. I became a business consultant, specializing in product development for start up companies.
I came out of retirement in 1986 after some bad investment decisions, and went to work as a manager of Paper Plus, a division of Unisource World Wide. I retired again after fourteen years in September 2000.
My many hobbies over the years include backpacking, rebuilding antique aircraft, flying, boating, fishing, writing poetry, reading and watching Biography and the History channel. And last but not least, teaching day-trading.
Looking for additional income, I received a familiar mail order pamphlet in 1994...you know the one [Ken Roberts TWMPMM manual], how to get rich quick in the commodities and futures business. I jumped right on in. Needless to say, I didn't get it. Kept looking for the Holy Grail! I read everything I could get my hands on, attending seminars, and lectures on how to get rich. I spent a small fortune on books, systems, and methods by the likes of Ken Roberts, Jake Bernstein, Nick Van Nice, and our old favorite Larry Williams.
Nothing worked for me, except an education in the commodities and futures business. Still thinking that this is a possible way to make money at home, I read an article on day-trading in “Futures” magazine. I tried paper trading some of the ideas presented in the article on the S&P; it just gave me brain cloud, way too much stuff to think about. In another article in “Futures”, Larry Williams and Miles Dunbar wrote about trading the Nasdaq 100 and looking at a divergence in the Dow.
Another article in the same magazine written by Michael A. Mermer talked about using the Nasdaq 100 as a leading indicator for the S&P 500 futures and said it was a great day-trading vehicle. At first it did not really sink in, until I started watching CNBC on television. They have those little arrows in a box showing the change in the Dow, Nasdaq, and S&P 500. A light went on for some reason, and I started watching every morning, keeping my eye on the Dow and the Nasdaq. At first I was looking for the divergence, then I noticed that when both the Dow and Nasdaq were in sync, the S&P 500 followed. The rest is history!
If you read my Simple-As-123 trading manual and/or spend time with my friend Dick Bernard and I in our Paltalk chat room, you will see how we use the Dow and Nasdaq markets as a primary indicator for our trading method. We call our method Simple-As-123 because we know of no simpler way to learn and trade the E-mini S&P 500 futures.