Filmed at the Woodward Memorial Symposium held at the 1981 ACS Annual Meeting in New York City, this is a discussion between three chemists remembering R. B. Woodward: Christopher S. Foote, Jerome A. Berson, and David M. Lemal. They focus less on his awards and achievements and more on his influence on mechanistic chemistry and specifically the impact of his particular approach to problem solving.

Robert Burns (R.B.) Woodward was a prolific American chemist who primarily worked on synthesizing complex organic molecules and won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1965. He is known for establishing that the synthesis of large, complex molecules (previously an impossible or tricky undertaking) could follow predictable rules and well-known principles, with complex processes broken down into many small steps.