Revenge of the nerd.

Richard MacNeal admits to having been a dweeb youth, but he then co-founded and programmed the success of software major MacNeal-Schwendler Corp.

Richard MacNeal, chairman of high tech MacNeal-Schwendler Corp., admits to a lot of faults.

As a kid, he says, he was a "nerd" and his social development was "retarded ... I was 17 and hadn't kissed a girl."

He says, "I was the worst football player you have ever seen" and, as a engineering student at Harvard University, "I had the highest glass-(beakers used in experiments) breaking bill in the history of the school."

That self-deprecating style has probably come in handy, smoothing the bumps in a working career that may now be close to an end. At 73, it is no longer a question of if he'll retire, but when. "I'm down to a little more than part-time (he works about three and a half days a week)," he says.

Recently, he relinquished the title of chief executive officer to Tom Curry.

MacNeal, a big man with a goatee and a full head of still dark hair, co-founded MacNeal-Schwendler in 1963 when he discovered he had problems working for other people. "You know how it is, you feel you could do it better," he says.

Along with his partner, the late Robert Schwendler, MacNeal started the computer software company from scratch. As he winds down his career there, MacNeal-Schwendler now has 625 employees and annual revenues of $130.5 million. It operates out of an office building on Colorado Boulevard in the Eagle Rock section of Los Angeles.

Despite his proclivity to make fun of himself, MacNeal is not entirely humble. He has written a book about the company, "The MacNeal-Schwendler Corporation, the First 20 Years," and he boasts that he is still probably the best mathematician in the company that is largely made up of highly skilled and educated people.

"Sometimes, when I think about what I'm going to do, I think I would like to get back to doing technical work, doing the research and mathematics," he says.

What M-S does is design software to test products. For instance, an aircraft manufacturer wants to build a new plane. M-S will design software that replicates the aircraft before it is built, thereby allowing the manufacturer to work out the kinks before actually building the plane.

During the 1980s, M-S did a lot of work for the military. But in recent years, it has shifted its focus to the commercial market, creating testing software for automobile and satellite makers and big manufacturing companies, among others.

MacNeal, a scientist with graduate degrees from California Institute of Technology, says he has operated the company mostly by the numbers. The hardest part of his career has been dealing with personnel matters, he says.

And the next hardest was keeping the company growing after the initial surge, which is often the case with high tech companies.

"A lot of companies have this tremendous growth and then they level off. They become what are called mature companies. I've had to rejuvenate the company, look for new ideas, new markets. That's been my job recently."

To keep the company fresh, he says, he has moved young people or young-thinking people up in the company. That has meant some older people have been moved out or reassigned.

MacNeal was born in Warsaw, Ind., but moved to Philadelphia with his family when he was three. His family, which included a brother and sister, were well off, and MacNeal went to Penn Charter, a 300-year-old private school run by the Quakers. MacNeal attended Penn Charter from kindergarten through the 12th grade and then he went to Harvard. "Harvard was the best, and I wanted to get away from home," he says.

After Harvard, which he finished in three years and at the height of World War II. he joined the Army and ended up at what is now Edwards Air Force Base, figuring out such things as trajectories for bombs.

After the war and newly married to his wife, Carolyn, MacNeal decided not to use $250 in Army pay to return home to Philadelphia. "I still feel guilty about that because it was supposed to be used to get home," he says. Instead, he and his wife decided to stay in Southern California and MacNeal enrolled in Cal Tech.

After receiving a Ph.D. in electrical engineering in 1949, MacNeal did some teaching at Cal Tech and some work for Computer Engineering Associates, a company formed by Cal Tech students and faculty.

In his late 30s, MacNeal look a job at Lockheed Corp., the big aerospace company. He hated it and lasted a year but it provided him with the impetus to form MacNeal-Schwendler.

"I was impatient, I just didn't fit into a big company like that. On my exit interview, they asked me if I wanted to know what my supervisor wrote about me. He said I was intelligent and talented and stuff like that, and then he said I was lacking in tact," recalls MacNeal, somewhat proudly.

"If you don't have any respect for your bosses, then you should leave," he says.

MacNeal hooked up with Schwendler, who at the time was also not happy where he was, says MacNeal, and the two formed MacNeal-Schwendler.

"Here I was, 39 years old and hadn't really done anything," recalls MacNeal about his thinking at the time. "I wasn't satisfied."

In his book, MacNeal outlines the ups and downs of the company, and recalls its scientific achievements and failures. One of the most traumatic experiences occurred in 1979 when Schwendler suddenly died.

Also in the book, MacNeal recounts straggles for contracts and he seems to mention every person who ever worked at the company.

As he gets older, MacNeal says he has mellowed a bit. He says he still has a quick temper and still rushes to judgment, often going with his first instinct rather than studying the matter. "But usually I'm right," he explains.

He says he still reads a lot. As the resident theoretician, MacNeal says he thinks about bigger pictures and doesn't like what he sees when it comes to the ongoing high-tech revolution.

He uses a profanity to describe what's happening. "It's b-----. We should be caring more about moral values. ... What's happening is that computers have become an end in themselves. They're not."

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Richard MacNeal

Age: 73

Native of: Warsaw, Ind.

Resident of: La Canada

Education: B.S., Harvard University; M.S., California Institute of Technology; Ph.D., California Institute of California

Spouse: Carolyn