Here is a personal memoir from Wayne Colonna, President of ATSG - Automatic Transmission Service Group:
When I was in New York for ATSG’s annual seminar earlier this year, I ran into a long time ATSG member Nick Diamond from Diamond Automatic Transmissions. Nick was one of the very first subscribers to ATSG joining us in 1986. That was back in the day when I was working as a rebuilder at Gibraltar Transmissions in Staten Island New York and was an ATSG member myself. Nick then told me he had sold his business and retired. I congratulated him and then asked “If you are retired why are you here at the ATSG seminar?” He then said that he wanted to see us all again and still wanted to be around the guys and enjoy the seminar as he had for the past 26 years.
But what really choked me up was, he wanted me to have his ATSG subscriber card that he carried in his pocket for all those years as a memorabilia. Well I just was lost for words. He handed me his card and as I looked at it I was thinking of the many times we spoke by phone fixing problems yet we always had time to ask how our families were doing. We are going to miss Nick, but all the best to him in the next chapter of his life.
By the way, he was a real good machinist as well! :)