H. Charles Baker, Senior Lecturer in Electrical Engineering in the Lyle School of Engineering, came to SMU in 1956 as an instructor in the Department of Electrical Engineering. He learned to program SMU's first digital computer when the Univac 1103 arrived in 1957. He took a leave of absence in 1960 to earn his Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Texas at Austin and returned to SMU as Associate Professor of Electrical Engineering in 1962. Upon the founding of the Computer Science Department in 1966, he received a joint appointment as Associate Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science. He left SMU in 1968 to become head of Development and Planning of Telecommunications Systems for Exxon U.S.A., headquartered in Houston. At Exxon he was involved in telecommunications systems on land, water, air and space and helped to develop the Marisat System. Professor Baker returned to SMU in 1980 and has been teaching telecommunications systems courses for the past 30 years. He has authored three books and 65 technical papers and has made 87 invited presentations to technical conferences on four continents. He received 17 Outstanding Faculty Awards and was honored by the Student Senate as Outstanding SMU Professor in 2001. He retires as Professor Emeritus of Electrical Engineering.