My name is Jim Rhoades.  I live in the Hill Country west of San Antonio, Texas.  I was raised, the oldest of seven children, on a farm outside of Grain Valley, Missouri.  Grain Valley is about 40 miles east of Kansas City. 

After completing high school I attended a year of college at Central Missouri State University in Warrensburg, Missouri.  I then joined the U.S. Navy (August, 1969), completed training as a Radioman at the Naval Training Center, San Diego, California, and received orders to NAVCOMSTA, Ft. Allen, Puerto Rico. 

Ft. Allen was located about 16 miles east of Ponce, Puerto Rico.  I spent most of my three and a half years there (March, 1970 – August, 1973) working at the Receiver Site located in Salinas, Puerto Rico (about 20 miles east of Ft. Allen). 

After discharge from the Navy I completed computer technology training in Kansas City and worked there several years before completing my college degree (Central Missouri State) and relocating to Houston, Texas.  We lived in Houston approximately seven years and then relocated to San Antonio, Texas where we now reside.  In 2002 I completed my master’s degree with an MBA in Electronic Commerce.  It is my hope to one day be able to retire and teach at the university level. 

My wife, Ana, and I have a son, Jason (age 32), and a daughter, Michelle (age 26).  Annie is from Ponce, Puerto Rico and we still make trips there when possible to visit family. 

I have several hobbies which occupy much of my free time.  The first is backpacking the Rockies of Colorado.  I have been pack-packing parts of the Colorado Trail since 1994 and have climbed two of Colorado’s 14ers along the way (Mt. Elbert and Mt. Massive). 

My second hobby is the study of  World War II history, primarily the European Theatre.  My father was a half-track driver in Company C, 10^th Armored Infantry Battalion, of General George Patton’s 4^th Armored Division during the Battle of the Bulge.  I have conducted studies of many of the American and German military leaders, as well as many famous battles.

My final hobby is Genealogy – family research.  Between 2001 and 2005 I was able to track down much information and locate many descendents of Edward Gaston Rhodes in the area around Bowie, Texas.  Edward Gaston Rhodes was a brother to my great grandfather.  I recently completed the 2^nd edition of a book detailing the history of the Edward Gaston Rhodes family.   

I am now working on the completion of another book depicting the history of my mother’s family – the descendents of Thomas Gray.  Thomas brought his family from Ireland to Charleston, South Carolina in 1792.  He passed away in 1834 and is buried along with his wife in a small cemetery outside New Washington, Indiana.  The research of this book has been much more time consuming as the descendents of Thomas Gray migrated to many various locations across the central United States.