About the Author

Felix Neals, a New York State civil servant, retired as Supervising Administrative Law Judge, and Special Deputy Secretary of State, Department of State. Prior to government service, he worked for ITT Corporation (as administrator of education) and legal counsel and for RCA as administrator early-education computer applications (a joint venture with Dr. Patrick Suppes of Stanford University's Institute for Mathematical Research in the Social Sciences). At an underage, Felix enlisted in military service. After an honorable discharge from military service (WW II, Pacific Theater), he attended and received a B.S. from Idaho State University, was elected to Who's Who in American Colleges and Universities, won a U.S. National Intercollegiate Oratory Championship, and was awarded the Degree of Special Distinction in Pi Kappa Delta Honor Society. He was a finalist in an annual competition of Yale University Series for Younger Poets.Felix obtained a J.D. from Washburn University School of Law, Topeka, Kansas. It was in Kansas at the Menninger Foundation (psychiatric treatment and research center) as an employee and outpatient that Felix's prior psychiatric diagnoses of "mental retardation" to "schizophrenia" were displaced by the word, "autism," then a relatively new medical label. His writings include articles on Psychosystematics (Felix's method of forging conceptual mental networks to subjugate autism to his life); two books of essays, short stories, and poetry: "Autistic Reflections in a Steel Mirror Reflected" and "Autism in Black Matter."