“I thought it was a way to get interviewed by very smart people and make improvements,” said the 2015 Fort Dodge Senior High graduate. “I was using it as a stepping stone to improve my skills in interviewing.”

Lowery didn’t necessarily anticipate landing a job. But then he was called back for a second interview. And then he was flown out to California for a series of more interviews.

“I didn’t have high expectations for myself so I was like, ‘Wow, I got through one. It’s kind of like playing with house money and things were going well,” he said.

Ultimately, he was hired by SpaceX as a manufacturing engineer. He’s about a month into the job in Hawthorne, California.

“I couldn’t turn it down because it was a really great opportunity and I was really interested in working there after I got to talk to some people,” Lowery said.

Lowery was born and raised in Fort Dodge. His father works as a diesel mechanic at Mid Country Machinery. That’s where Lowery thinks he first became interested in how machines operate.

“I was around heavy machines a lot,” he said. “One of my first interests was tractors and trucks and things like that.”

But Lowery wouldn’t discover his passion for engineering until much later.

One of his first passions was welding.

“In high school I wanted to be a welder,” Lowery said. “I was going to go to Iowa Central to be a welder and machinist. I had a goal of starting my own machine shop and working on my own projects. I did some SkillsUSA competitions. I did a lot of projects in high school.”

He credits his brother for leading him to welding.

“I got into welding, I think, because my brother was in the class and he’s two years older than me and it seemed like fun,” Lowery said. “I was a freshman when I took the first welding class. I played with Legos and stuff when I was younger but wasn’t the stereotypical engineer where I knew it was what I wanted to do. It was something I tried and something I’ve loved since.”

Lowery said his industrial technology teachers at Fort Dodge Senior High had a positive impact on him. They pushed him to reach for higher goals than what he would have on his own.

“Senior year I took a machining class with the welding teacher (Andy Kavanaugh) and ended up learning that I really liked machining,” Lowery said.

Other instructors encouraged him to explore engineering.

“At the time during senior year I honestly didn’t know what an engineer did or what they would work on,” he said. “They put that in my mind. I talked with (Kavanaugh) more and he said I should try something difficult to challenge myself. I was better than a lot of my peers at welding, so he thought I should try something more difficult.”

Soon, Lowery applied to the University of Iowa.

“It was the only place I applied,” he said. “My grandpa went there. Luckily, I got in.”

Lowery admits he was a little behind when he began his studies in Iowa City.

“I didn’t take physics or calculus in high school,” he said. “I wasn’t prepared. I feel like a lot of my peers had taken calculus. I was behind the 8-ball, but I was pretty determined.”

Soon, Lowery realized the more he challenged himself, the greater the reward felt.

“I was really enjoying these new classes and having these experiences,” he said. “I got involved in research at Iowa. I had a friend who talked me into it and I liked it quite a bit.”

Lowery would go on to earn a bachelor’s degree in engineering from Iowa. He was then awarded a funded position at the University of Wisconsin to conduct research with a professor there.

Lowery studied ultra precision machining.

“I did research on using lasers and that’s how I got into advanced manufacturing,” Lowery said. “My thesis was on ultra precision machining — setting distance between cutting tool and the workpiece at the nanometer level. You need special microscopes to even measure.”

In the summer of 2021, he completed an internship at an aerospace company in Wisconsin that specialized in nonrotational jet engine parts.

Lowery earned his master’s degree in engineering from the University of Wisconsin in December 2021.

Lowery said he has done some reflecting in recent weeks.

“It kind of relates to the rest of my journey,” he said. “A lot of my opportunities have come from doing difficult things. I feel like I got to where I am now because I tried hard things. I was motivated to try challenging goals and work on hard problems. It wasn’t fun all the time. It was a lot of hard work. But it was worth it. I wouldn’t trade the hard work for the fun. Maybe that’s just me and I like challenges. A lot of successful people do the challenging things. If I had a piece of advice, I’d say choose to do the hard thing.”

While Lowery said he’s not allowed to discuss many specifics of his job, he said he’s been surprised at the high number of young people who are employed by SpaceX.

“I work with a lot of smart people and it’s pretty astonishing how young they are and the work we are doing,” he said. “You can see from watching the launches that they are pretty impressive. We are landing rockets regularly and a lot of that work is done by pretty young people.”

One habit that Lowery has formed is reading an hour before bed every night.

“The last hour of my day I enjoy because I try to read for an hour before bed,” he said. “I always give myself enough time to read. That’s a big thing I never used to do. I started reading more at Iowa. I feel like it helps me a lot. I read a lot of technical books, engineering-related books or some motivational books recently.”

Lowery is looking forward to continuing to develop his skills. He hopes that one day he can give back to Fort Dodge.

“Just being the best engineer I can be and becoming successful in a way that I’m able to give back to people that helped me along the way,” he said. “I’d like to mentor students or make donations to STEM programs at FDSH or something like that. I wouldn’t be where I am now without the support I’ve had along the way.”