I have spent the week with my North American information security colleagues from Oracle, meeting on the historic Oracle/Sun Microsystems campus in Santa Clara, California.  What a delight it was to visit this beautiful campus once again as I mingled with so many friends and professional associates.  This business campus was built on the site of the former Agnews Insane Asylum.  Several of the elegant old buildings remain, suitably updated and equipped for modern use.  But I heard flitting comments today that some people think these buildings are haunted.

Back in the day, the Clock Tower building was known as the Treatment Center.  It makes you wonder what went on there … and what ghosts the “treatments” left behind.

Here are a couple of photos I took of the Clock Tower building with my iPhone this week.

 

It was interesting that a Sun Microsystems sign/monument still occupies a prominent position in the rear of the Clock Tower building, near another smaller monument honoring a Sun Microsystems leader who perished in the 9/11 bombing in 2001. What irony!

All the other signs were brightly accented with bright Oracle red – a fitting reminder about whose campus this really is.

But it has been suitably nostalgic to visit this place today.  As I participated in an hour-long conference call while sitting on the concrete bench surrounding the beautiful fountain near the rear of the Clock Tower building today, I couldn’t help but think of the many, many hours I spent on this campus during my five years with Sun Microsystems, the wonderful colleagues I worked with, and the dreams we shared together.