Happy Birthday: Earl Pace (BDPA Founder)

I join BETF-Blog readers in wishing a glorious birthday to our visionary leader and founder -- Earl A. Pace, Jr. All current BDPA members and leaders should take a moment today to reflect on our organizational legacy ... the shoulders on which we stand today ...

---

I don't know the year of birth for Mr. Pace. I do know that National BDPA only had one president in the 1970s...

Earl Pace served as our national leader from 1976 thru 1980. Earl has been in the Information Technology (IT) industry since 1965. He began as a computer programmer trainee at the Pennsylvania Railroad. He left the PRR in 1967. Over the next ten years, he rose through the ranks of programmer, programmer analyst, programming manager to Vice President of a financial telecommunications company in Philadelphia, PA.

Earl Pace became a business owner in 1976 when he incorporated Pace Data Systems for which he is still president. Pace Data Systems is a full service information technology firm providing services through its Philadelphia, PA and Washington, DC offices primarily to banks.

In 1975, he co-founded BDPA in Philadelphia and operated as its president for two years. In 1978, he coordinated the formation of BDPA into a national organization and functioned as its first National President until 1980. BDPA has grown into the largest national professional organization representing people of African descent in the IT industry.

In 1997, he received the National Technical Association’s National Technical Achiever Award as Computer Scientist of the Year.

In 2001 and 2002, Black Money Magazine named him as one of the 50 Most Influential African Americans in Information Technology.

Within BDPA and on a broader national scale, Earl Pace has been a vocal advocate for business ownership. His primary message since starting BDPA has been that African Americans should strive to rise above "just a job" to membership on the Board of Directors and beyond that to owning and operating their own business. Earl continues to be very active in the business and education community in Philadelphia, Washington DC and Baltimore, MD.

He is a graduate of The Pennsylvania State University and pursued graduate studies at Temple University in Philadelphia. He is married and has one daughter, one son and one granddaughter.

BETF-Blog readers, care to share your favorite memory about Bro. Pace?