Hello. My name is John P. Philpott, Jr. My family has called me Pete since I was a little tot. My friends call me Jay. Thus the name Jay Pete. As the old saying goes, "You can call me anything you like, just don't call me late for dinner".

Thank you for visiting my web page.

A friend helped me build my web site and believe you me, if it hadn't been for him, it would never have been built. This has been quite a learning experience for me. That old saying, "You can't teach an old dog new tricks", has been shot down by the fact that this site is completed. Well, its not exactly completed yet, but I hope to wrap it up soon.

For most of my life I have worked for one of the major airlines in this country. I started out in Chicago and worked there for five years, which included two years spent in the Army. While in the Army I was stationed in California. Needless to say I got to like that "California living", even in the Army. After my discharge from the Army, I went back to work in Chicago. The temperature was 105 degrees and the humidity was about 99 percent. That winter the snow covered the ground from October to March. That was enough for me, so I put in a transfer to go back to California.

First I was offered a job in Oakland, California which I accepted. But before my transfer came through, they closed down the Oakland office. This created more jobs in the San Francisco office, as they would handle the work formally done by the Oakland office. I was offered one of those jobs in San Francisco and accepted. While living there I learned to ski in the Sierra Nevada Mountains around Lake Tahoe and to sail on San Francisco Bay. Visit my Skiing and my Sailing page for more information on these activities.

After 23 years in San Francisco, our office was transferred to the Dallas/Fort Worth area. I did not want to make this move, but having developed the habit of eating, I decided that it was best to go. New jobs were not easy to find at this time of my life. The day I arrived at the Dallas/Fort Worth airport, the temperature was 108 degrees but no humidity. I looked around for something to do during my spare time and discovered that there were quite a few lakes near by. So I bought another sailboat and put in on Lake Grapevine just north of the airport. Needless to say, sailing on a lake in the heat of a Texas summer is no where near as much fun as sailing on San Francisco Bay any time of the year. So after two years, the sailboat was sold.

One day I was in a bookstore and saw a magazine on toy trains. I purchased the magazine and took it home, sat down in my easy chair, and began to read. Nice stories. Nice pictures. Nice articles on what you could build and do with a train layout. In the back of the magazine was a list of toy train dealers in the area. After visiting a couple, I bought my first toy train. That was the beginning of the last twenty years of my life where I have purchased, sold and collected toy trains. Visit my trains page for more information on this hobby.

Somewhere along the line I picked up an interest in family history. I do not remember my grand parents. I was the baby of a large family and they died soon after I was born. One of my sisters had given me a book on the Hardy family and another had given me a book on the ancestors of an Edward Philpott. These names did not mean a thing to me. I looked through the books and none of my family was there so just laid them aside and forgot about them. One day, while waiting for a plumber to arrive to change some things for me, I noticed these books laying on a table and started going through them again. For some reason I started to draw up a family tree. This was the beginning of another experience and of learning about my family. Visit my Family History page to learn about my ancestors.

I hope you tour all the pages listed on the menu. If you have any questions on any of these pages, please e-mail me. If you do e-mail me please use as the subject of your e-mail the title of the page you are asking about, such as "Trains", or "Family Tree". This way I will know I need to respond to your e-mail as soon as possible.

Thank you again, and enjoy yourself.

Jay Pete

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6-15-2001