Tuesday, November 3, 2009 - Remembering Steve Judd

It grieves me to announce the passing of a good man, pioneer roboticist, teacher, engineer, inventor, and all-around nice guy Steve Judd. Steve passed last week Tuesday after a long battle with a rare illness that he kept, for the most part to himself. When the AstroDay Institute decided to start a student-teacher robotics workshop during the summer of 2006, one of the human resources who gave selflessly to our program was Steve and his lovely wife Nora. Steve and Nora resided in Captain Cook, on the west side of Hawaii Island, but made the two hour drive to Hilo to give special demonstrations of his robotics creations to our pupils. I can still vividly recall the different robots that he would bring: a triangular, three-wheeled rover, a couple of sumobots, and a bipedal walker. Each would evoke oohs and ahs from the gallery, as students, educators, and even robotics instructors and program organizers would be spellbound by the electro-mechanical creations of Steve‘s fertile mind. He had a way with electronic gizmos, and was imminently approachable by young and old alike. Steve made himself available to the robotics students of Konawaena High School on a regular basis during the school year, and helped start their fledgling program. As one of the founders of the Robot Fighting League, Steve pretty much helped write the book on combat robotics prior to the heyday of televised shows like Battlebots. I could go on and on about Steve‘s accomplishments in life. But what I remember most about this man is his commitment to giving back to the hobby in his work with the schools, teachers and students. His memorial will be held at Pu‘u Honua o Honaunau this Saturday at 3:30 pm near the picnic area. It will be an informal kanikapila and potluck dinner in his honor, and I‘ll be there with guitar to help send my friend off.