In 1966, a 10-year-old in Sensible County watched an episode of “Star Trek” – the episode wherein Captain Kirk is court-martialed on grounds of perjury. The proof in opposition to him is the ship’s laptop log, which recorded evidence in direct contradiction of how Kirk reported a specific incident. Spoiler alert: Spock was in a position to decide that the pc had been tampered with – hacked is the time period we’d use now – and Kirk was cleared.
That episode made a strong impression on the teen in Sensible County. And that’s why the Sensible County Circuit Courtroom Clerk’s workplace has, for practically three a long time, been on the forefront of technological innovation in each the state and the nation. It’s additionally why that teen – now 66 – has signed a contract with an organization that guarantees to ship him to the moon.
We’re skipping over plenty of motion in between then and now, and a few future date with eternity, so let’s again up and canopy that floor.
The speedy information: Essentially the most well-known court docket clerk in Virginia is retiring. This hasn’t actually been a secret however Jack Kennedy made it official lately. He is not going to be looking for reelection subsequent 12 months as clerk of court docket in Sensible County. He’d slightly we not use the phrase “retiring.” From his perspective, he’s merely leaving the put up and embarking on a wholly new profession in a brand new place – the area enterprise in Florida.
Courtroom clerks don’t typically make the information. Kennedy has spent 28 years or extra making information – first for the technological modifications he’s launched to the workplace, then for utilizing his place as an elected official to advocate extra broadly for the expansion of a know-how sector in Southwest Virginia. That’s what makes Kennedy’s impending departure, each from the workplace and from the state, so noteworthy.
I first met Kennedy in 1985 and it was considerably embarrassing. I used to be masking Doug Wilder’s marketing campaign for lieutenant governor for The Roanoke Occasions and Wilder spoke at a Democratic dinner in Sensible County. Kennedy was the grasp of ceremonies and launched all of the dignitaries who have been current. He then proceeded to do one thing I’d by no means seen – he began introducing all of the out-of-town journalists. We journalists are likely to choose to sit down at the back of the room unnoticed, however that was not Kennedy’s method: He named each single one in all us and made us stand as much as be acknowledged. It was my first inkling that Kennedy was somebody who was not afraid to interrupt with custom.
I knew then that Kennedy was a political junkie from a younger age – a legislative aide, a nationwide officer for the Younger Democrats, a nationwide conference delegate on the age of 20. What I didn’t know then was that he was additionally an area buff. He grew up watching “Star Trek” with extra enthusiasm than most of us. “I used to be a Trekker, not a Trekkie,” he explains. “I don’t costume up as Captain Kirk.” However that “Courtroom Martial” episode made a strong impression on him – he noticed the intersection of regulation and computer systems. When he was 15, Kennedy went to Florida to see Apollo 14 launched to the moon, the third mission that landed on the floor. It was a heady time to be desirous about area exploration. By the tip of the subsequent 12 months, although, the moon program had been canceled by a nation that had grown bored of the journey. Kennedy was baffled. He didn’t go into area however he did go into the regulation – and finally computer systems.
In 1987, Kennedy challenged a Democratic incumbent, received the nomination after which the final election to the Home of Delegates. This was again within the days when the coal counties nonetheless elected Democrats. In actual fact, in these days, the coal counties most popular Democrats, however that’s one other story. In 1991, when then-state Sen. John Buchanan handed away, Kennedy ran for, and received, a state Senate seat. That didn’t final lengthy. Inhabitants change squeezed a Senate seat out of Southwest Virginia and Kennedy wound up in a district paired with Republican incumbent William Wampler Jr. Wampler received and continued to serve for a lot of extra years. In 1995, the Sensible County court docket clerk died; Kennedy ran within the particular election to fill the rest of the time period and received. He’s been reelected ever since.
Politically, the clerkship appeared one thing of a comfort prize however Kennedy certain hasn’t handled it like that.
Throughout the time between that election and when he formally took workplace, Kennedy learn two books – concurrently, he mentioned. One was “The Highway Forward,” co-written by Invoice Gates, a just-published e book that seemed on the implications of the pc age and the arrival of one thing known as the World Extensive Internet that was then solely a rumor to most individuals. The opposite e book was a a lot older textual content by Napoleon Hill, a Sensible County self-help guru from the early 1900s – his “17 rules of non-public achievement.” The teachings of these two books merged collectively in his thoughts with that “Star Trek” episode from his youth: It was time to convey the pc revolution to the clerk’s workplace.
At a time when most individuals didn’t even know what the web was, Kennedy set about attempting to place court docket data on-line. “I grew to become fascinated with figuring out that know-how may very well be taken one step additional,” he told the Associated Press in 1996. “I stored considering, why are we ready? The know-how is right here now.” He shortly bumped into obstacles: Legal professional Basic Jim Gilmore dominated that he didn’t have the authority. In time, these antiquated state legal guidelines fell by the wayside. In 2000, the Sensible County clerk’s workplace grew to become the primary within the nation to document the digital submitting of a deed. Through the years since, his workplace grew to become the primary to place felony data on-line and to make it doable to use for or renew hid weapons permits on-line. His workplace is now concerned in a first-in-the-nation effort to use blockchain technology to create searchable land switch data. “Folks have the final conception you can stroll right into a clerk’s workplace, push a button and have a 40-to-60 12 months title summary accomplished and that’s not true,” he mentioned. However within the months forward it is going to be – in Sensible County. For generations, clerk’s workplaces have dealt in paper. Kennedy sees paper as out of date. “We’ve mainly tried to have a look at work circulation and tried to eradicate paper,” he mentioned. “The conundrum has been the 2 state prisons [Red Onion and Wallens Ridge]. We will’t give inmates laptops to ship their pleadings.”
Whereas clerk, Kennedy has nonetheless discovered time to pursue his area ardour, which is able to quickly turn into greater than only a ardour. He obtained a grasp’s diploma in area coverage and area regulation, from the College of North Dakota. He jokes that a lot of his fellow college students have been Air Pressure officers accountable for nuclear missile silos – they’ve plenty of downtime wherein to review, he says. Kennedy has visited the Russian spaceflight amenities (again when our relationships with Russia have been a bit hotter than they’re now). He’s attended conferences of the Worldwide Astronomical Union, the governing physique for all issues astronomical. Nearer to house, Gov. Tim Kaine – a fellow Democrat – appointed Kennedy to the state’s industrial area flight authority attempting to advertise industrial area launches from Wallops Island on the Jap Shore; Republican Gov. Bob McDonnell reappointed him. I can inform you from my expertise as a journalist that you just’ve by no means met somebody from Southwest Virginia extra enthusiastic in regards to the potential of the Jap Shore as Kennedy has been, at the very least the place area flights are involved. He talks up connections he’s made with area corporations in Israel and South Korea that he hopes to lure to Wallops Island. Underneath later Democratic governors, Kennedy was named to the Virginia Aviation Board.
As clerk, Kennedy hasn’t simply embraced know-how in his personal workplace, he’s made the case for why the entire of Southwest Virginia must be a know-how hub. He’s pushed the area as a great place for testing drones, and helped make doable what’s known as “the Kitty Hawk second” for drones – the first commercial drone flight was in Wise County. He’s advocated for information facilities (our readers in Northern Virginia who really feel themselves overrun by information facilities will discover this unimaginable, however there are components of rural Virginia which can be begging for information facilities and the roles and tax income they might convey). He’s championed Elon Musk’s satellite-based Starlink web as a great possibility for coalfield counties that will by no means see in-ground broadband fiber. He’s organized for college students from Sensible County to launch experiments on area flights out of Wallops Island. A few of you’ll have tuned out a lot earlier on the point out that Kennedy is a Democrat, however these nonetheless with us right here ought to know what Del. Terry Kilgore, R-Scott County, instructed me about Kennedy a couple of years in the past after I was with The Roanoke Times: “He’s performing some nice work on getting some drone firms in. He’s actually doing an excellent job, being an excellent ambassador. There aren’t any ‘D’ or ‘R’ points – he’s a Democrat; I’m a Republican – however he’s attempting to assist the world.” Kennedy has taken the somnolent clerk’s workplace and used it as a place from which to turn into a quasi-economic developer.
All of the whereas, although, Kennedy has had his eye on an extended recreation – and it’s not in Southwest Virginia. He purchased a apartment in Cape Canaveral from which he may view area launches. When one other apartment constructing went up, blocking his view, he offered the primary one and acquired within the new one. I can affirm that it has an excellent view of rocket launches. 5 years in the past I used to be in Florida and Kennedy invited me to his place to witness a satellite tv for pc launch. We watched from the balcony because the rocket rose into the sky – after which watched one thing I discovered much more superb: Lately the rockets come again down and land upright (if all goes effectively). Kennedy deliberately didn’t inform me about one thing else: When these rockets come again down, they set off sonic booms that may knock you off your ft. He discovered that fairly humorous. I did, too – as soon as I bought my breath again.
Whereas clerk, Kennedy has developed a aspect hustle in Florida. His spouse, Janette, has a journey company (You Identify It Holidays) that works with individuals coming to view rocket launches. “There’s sometimes an area launch at Cape Canaveral each week now,” he says. “I anticipate that may develop in quantity to the place there are two or three per week, climate allowing.” Was, the one method into area was by means of NASA. Now area is being quickly commercialized. Kennedy has signed on as an adviser to Celestis, an organization that launches cremated stays into area. Its first flight, in 1997, carried the stays of Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry and ’60s activist Timothy O’Leary. When family and friends journey to the cape to look at their family members blasted into area, the Kennedys deal with the journey preparations. “If they’ve 1,000 individuals we deal with their lodge preparations, their meals preparations, buses to move individuals,” he says. And if they need a post-flight cruise, You Identify It’ll deal with that, too.
Kennedy’s household has gravitated south, to South Carolina and Florida and, like many a grandparent, he desires to be nearer to his grandchildren. So, sure, after he leaves workplace he’ll transfer full-time to Florida. However, he stresses, he’s not retiring. “I simply hope I’m younger sufficient to launch a brand new profession,” he says. He jokes that senior residents Joe Biden and Donald Trump have been inspirations in that regard. Extra severely, “I could search for employment within the industrial sector or persist with the gig financial system,” he says. No matter that subsequent job is, it is going to be aerospace-related. “I’m an orphan of Apollo,” Kennedy says. “I now hope at hand issues off to my granddaughter who’s a part of the Artemis technology – Apollo’s sister.” (Artemis is the identify of the brand new American moon program that goals to land the primary girl on the moon.) “I used to be concerned within the first industrial drone flight; this provides me an opportunity to run full circle in life,” he says.
Kennedy additionally has one last act deliberate. Celestis hopes subsequent 12 months to land human stays on the moon (sure, that is authorized beneath worldwide treaties governing area journey). Kennedy has signed the paperwork to ship his personal stays to the moon when the time comes. “That,” he says, “shall be my last contribution to the industrial area sector.”
