HR “Bum” Bright was a local Dallas businessman who, at the heighth of his career, owned a bank, an oil company and the Dallas Cowboys. By 1990, he was one of the richest men in the state of Texas. Then the oil crunch hit, the real estate market crumbled, savings and loans needed to be rescued by the government and the Dallas Cowboys experienced a lull with the firing of legendary coach Tom Landry.

In the late 1980’s the government dissolved the FSLIC (Federal Savings & Loan Insurance Corporation) and rolled the efforts into the more stable FDIC (Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation). Additionally, Savings & Loan establishments were siezed by the government and the real estate holdings were sold through a newly created entity called the RTC (Resolution Trust Corporation).

I was hired as a special employee to install a beta test of CA (Computer Associates) banking software system which still had undeveloped components, and work directly with CA developers in solving problems and general troubleshooting.

After nearly a year, the bank was sold to Nation’s Bank, which was when I departed in order to return to a full-time consulting position with a consulting firm out of St. Louis which was starting a Dallas office.