Alumnus makes tough ‘double E’ degree pay off

Mark Harrison

Mark Harrison

Mark Harrison (BBA 81, BSEE 85) believes that being an electrical engineer is at the “top of the food chain when it comes to engineering.”

The UM alumnus’s perspective comes from 24 years of experience with the development of missile systems. In addition, Harrison owns and leads three companies: Harrison Research Corp. (HRC), OTG/OPS Inc. (Over the Garage Operations) and L4Dogs (Love for Dogs).

HRC provides technical support to the U.S. government that includes mission and system engineering, modeling and simulation, and missile hardware evaluations. Over the Garage Operations is a commercial company that provides security solutions through a product suite called InfoLog. The monitoring software includes tools to record all websites visited and keystrokes entered while using Internet Explorer. Love for Dogs is an animal breeding and rescue company.Harrison said honesty and integrity are keys to success in business and as an engineer.

“Also, you must be thorough in your technical capability and results,” he said. “It is a very tough world out there, but if you hang in there with credibility, good things will happen.”

Harrison credits the engineering education he received at Ole Miss as having set him on his successful career path.

“After I got my business degree and was unable to find a job, I decided to challenge myself,” Harrison said. “I asked my adviser what was the hardest curriculum at Ole Miss, and he told me ‘double E.’ It took some major league lobbying, but I finally got into engineering school.”

Electrical engineering professors Charles Smith, Mark Tew, Allen Glisson, Darko Kaifez and Perry Wheless took Harrison under their wings.

“All of the professors had an ‘open door’ policy. If you wanted to see any of them, they were always there to help,” said the Winona native, who also acknowledged faculty in the math and physics departments for helping him earn his engineering degree.

“I can guarantee that earning an engineering degree at Ole Miss gives you the tools to compete at the highest levels,” Harrison said. “They embrace creativity and the mentally challenged and want you to succeed. I would also like to thank Dr. Allie Smith for a great deal of help when I was elected president of the Engineering Student Body.”

'The Ole Miss Engineer' 1985

During his time as ESB president, Harrison petitioned and restarted the Ole Miss Engineer magazine/newsletter after it was stopped for two years.

“Years later, Mark was informed that our office didn’t have a copy of certain issues of the Engineer,” said Alex Cheng, dean of the School of Engineering. “He donated a copy of Vol. 1, No. 1, which is exactly the issue that was missing from our records.”

“He is very proud that he brought back the Ole Miss Engineer after an absence,” said Kevin Gardner, development officer for the School of Engineering.

Harrison’s father, Louie Vardaman Harrison Jr., graduated from Ole Miss and played third base for the Rebels’ baseball team in the 1950s. The entire family attended every home football game, earning their own parking spot in the Grove.

“It didn’t matter what time we got there; everyone knew it was the Harrisons’ parking spot,” Harrison said. “We loved eating ham and sausage biscuits, fried chicken and sharing with anyone that came by.”

While Harrison was playing football at Winona High School, coaches from Ole Miss and other colleges recruited him, but Harrison always knew where he was going to college.

“When other colleges would come to the door, my mom would turn them away and tell them, ‘My son is going to Ole Miss no matter what,’” he said. “Even though I didn’t get a scholarship from the university, I felt bound to go there because of tradition and love for Ole Miss!”

Following graduation, Harrison became the lead technical point of contact for the Advanced Hypersonic Weapon Technology Demonstrator program for Prompt Global Strike. As vice president/chief scientist of Miltec Corp., he was the technical lead for the Low Cost Interceptor program, KE-ASAT program, satellite communications for the Wideband Technology program and a subcontractor for the Boeing Center of Excellence for simulation.

“I have earned the opportunity to technically direct and manage support efforts for the Theater High Altitude Area Defense and the Exoatmospheric Reentry Vehicle Interceptor Subsystem seeker, signal processing and data processing preflight performance analysis efforts from January ’86 to first successful intercept in January ’91,” Harrison said. “Getting a degree in engineering from Ole Miss has given me the chance to gain a broad knowledge of systems engineering and systems analysis.”

Harrison’s family members include his wife, Elizabeth, brothers Louie and Lee, and sisters Pam and Katherine. Both his parents are deceased.

His hobbies include playing guitar, shooting pool, fine dining, golf, socializing after work and watching his favorite television shows and sports.