Ray Cruz Biography:

'A man of the 60's making good use of the tools of the third millennium. '   When Ray went to college, math was done on the slide rule.  He wondered in those days if he would ever see the next century and the next millennium.  Studying physics, English, psychology, music, education and public administration, Ray gathered a lot of information about the world and many of its institutions.

During his college years, Ray played the organ in several musical groups.  The music of Carlos Santana was one of his inspirations.   As a Probation Officer at the Central Juvenile Hall Detention Facility in East Los Angeles,  his first professional job, he saw the connection between educational failure and antisocial behavior. As a guidance counselor for the East Los Angeles Skills Center, he learned how important it was for our youth to get a good basic education.  In the 70's and 80's Ray was glad to help young minorities access a higher education through various programs such as the Educational Opportunity Program, Talent Search and the Educational Opportunity Center.  In these programs, Ray served as an administrator and outreach facilitator at Cal State University Long Beach and the University of California at Los Angeles.  He also found time to help secure funding for a Head Start program in Long Beach to help pre-school children get a solid foothold for elementary school.

When Ray went to college, there were no computer science programs.  Nonetheless, Ray has spent over a decade as a computer consultant and programmer.  Most of his consulting work has been focused on the mortgage industry and credit card processing.  The credit card industry is fascinating to Ray because credit card networks preceded the internet and process millions of dollars around the world every minute of every day.  'Without credit cards, the monetary wheel of the world would come to a grinding halt!', according to Ray.  Ray's knowledge of the ecommerce world is demonstrated in another web site that he created called Merchant Goldmine www.merchantgoldmine.com.  Ray's newest cyber creation called the Maculator, which involves the use of the latest .NET (dot net) technology, can be found at www.mgoldmine.net.

When you browse around the World of Weeds, you will see that Ray is also an inventor and a poet.  He enjoys selling his patented Weed Twister because he knows it makes the job of weeding a lot more enjoyable for most people than any other tool.  By the way, Ray also wrote the application for his patent by himself and got it accepted by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office without the assistance of an attorney.  Poetry is an outlet for many strong emotions, both positive and negative, for Ray.  He values the internet for providing a platform for many people to express themselves through creative writing and to connect with people around the world without the need of a publisher or cutting down trees.  He is particularly pleased to see the variety of thoughts and emotions that are expressed in the poetry submitted in the Ergonica Weed Poetry Contest.  Ray believes that weeds can teach us many lessons, and the poetry submitted about weeds by the contestants shows great insight and depth.

Ray has always been fascinated by science, as is evident from much of the content of the World of Weeds.  Ray has also published his own ideas about the beginning of the universe in another web site called Grava-Space.net.  Although he does not claim to have the final answers, Ray is a strong believer in asking the hard questions and learning by observation.  'When you start to learn about biology and botany, you can't help but be amazed by the intricacies of nature in supporting life, even the life of the most simple weed or the lowest germ and bacteria'. says Ray.

Most children learn best by experience and natural curiosity, in Ray's opinion.  The biggest reward for a successful science project is the satisfaction of learning something about science and nature, and the subsequent thirst for even more knowledge.  Although Ray doesn't profit from most of the Science Project visitors, he is glad to see that curiosity prevails and the interest in the World of Weeds continues to grow every year.

Ray is also very proud of his father, Don Ramon Cruz, who was identified as the first bilingual radio announcer in Los Angeles in Steven Loza's book Barrio Rhythm: Mexican American Music in Los Angeles (Music in American Life).  This book also describes the Catolicos por la Raza movement in the 1970's that was led by Ray's brother, Richard V. Cruz.

Family photos: