The Shaughnessy Report: Goodbye, Dieter
August 27, 2014 |Estimated reading time: 1 minute
A lot of people love their jobs; I do, and I bet you feel the same way. But Dieter Bergman was different. He devoted most of his adult life to IPC, and to PCB design. His heart belonged to Bannockburn.
Many of you knew Dieter, or knew of him and his history, so I don’t need to rehash his biography. He was in on the ground floor of the modern PCB and EDA industries, and he helped shape IPC into what it is today. All of this made him a rock star among PCB designers. Designers always wanted a piece of Dieter, and he did his best to accommodate them.
I didn’t know Dieter that well, but I always enjoyed talking to him, and, more importantly, listening to him. It was a good idea to pay attention when Dieter was speaking; you could learn quite a bit from his stories. And what a storyteller he was.
And he told some of the funniest jokes, both clean and dirty, that I’ve ever heard. He was a child when his family moved from Europe to Philadelphia in the 1930s, and his first words of English were curse words. He loved to tell the story about a store owner who paid him to stop cussing in front of her store. The more he swore, the more money he made.
I first met Dieter at a trade show when I started covering the industry in the 1990s. I mentioned that I was still learning about the technology. He laughed and said, “So am I!” He was so down-to-earth about himself, and barely impressed with his dozens of awards and industry accolades. I think he found the “living legend” badge mildly amusing.
No, Dieter was usually much more interested in talking about an upcoming DFM presentation. He enjoyed working with PCB designers, identifying their challenges, and helping them stay ahead of the game. That’s what really animated him. Read the full column here.Editor's Note: This column originally appeared in the August 2014 issue of The PCB Design Magazine.