00:00:00 Link, several times during our very pleasant discussion on the somewhat hectic life you

00:00:26 live, you've referred to your family, the encouragement and inspiration they've given

00:00:33 you.

00:00:34 What about family life now?

00:00:37 Very important.

00:00:39 I have two boys, both grown, both mature, and they are in their own careers.

00:00:48 But going back before that for a while, I think a parent to be active has got to be

00:00:54 involved in the interests and the hobbies of the child, be it a boy or a girl, and to

00:00:59 me that was always enjoyable.

00:01:01 So our house to this day is full of model airplanes, model trains, radio control boats

00:01:06 that are left over from the days, and every once in a while we'll get together to talk

00:01:10 about some of those things that we used to do.

00:01:13 For example, my older boy was very much interested in railroads, so we were model railroaders.

00:01:20 And we had a model railroad in our house that must have been 22 feet in length.

00:01:26 It had everything on it, including a roundhouse, a turntable and a roundhouse for the engines,

00:01:31 all the scenery and the stuff that we had made.

00:01:34 I spent years at that, and it was great.

00:01:36 I learned a lot, the boys learned how to use their hands and forth, and then the younger

00:01:41 boy come along, who's now an architect, had totally different hobbies.

00:01:46 He was interested in boats, and again he got into radio control boats.

00:01:50 So again, working around here with all this electronic knowledge, it was great.

00:01:55 And we finally had a boat, which we still have, which is about four foot long, it's

00:02:01 radio control.

00:02:02 It has about four speeds, reverse, it has its own transistor radio, which you can turn

00:02:08 on and off on the shore, it has its own anchor which can be lowered if you want to stop somewhere,

00:02:14 all by remote control off on the shore.

00:02:16 My wife made lace curtains for it, for the cabin part, and we have lights on it, you

00:02:21 can turn it on at night, you can light the lights on the boat once, loads and loads of

00:02:25 fun with that.

00:02:26 So those hobbies were good, I think they helped the youngsters to grow.

00:02:29 But I guess the only thing about it was, between the work, the career, and the hobbies of the

00:02:36 youngsters, I didn't get to develop any hobbies of my own.

00:02:40 I know you were a great golfer, and I never really had a chance to do that, but I will

00:02:45 say with great pride that I have won what we call the Hole-in-One contest here at Bell

00:02:50 Laboratories one year.

00:02:52 And I knew not much about golfing at all, but I took a lucky swing, and I won the contest

00:02:57 to have a trophy at home commemorating that, yes.

00:03:00 Little luck always helps.

00:03:01 Oh yes, oh yes, I had quite a lot of luck.

00:03:03 Any grandchildren?

00:03:04 I'm expecting the first one in April, and so I'll go right back into hobbies again.

00:03:09 The only problem we'll have is we're going to have to use our airplanes, because he'll

00:03:13 be born on the West Coast, not on the East Coast, but we will now be back into the hobbies

00:03:17 for the children again.

00:03:18 That won't deter you?

00:03:19 No, no, no.

00:03:20 Not at all, not at all.

00:03:23 Good.

00:03:24 Well, I know you're a very active man, and anyone as active as you is going to sit around.

00:03:35 Along will come career number X.

00:03:39 I have it already planned.

00:03:41 Good.

00:03:42 Why don't you, if you had a group of these young students, and we've both spoken very

00:03:47 frequently about the importance of them, what would you tell them now?

00:03:51 What would you like to do?

00:03:54 And in connection with that, what do you see as the new developments, especially in this

00:04:01 all-important field of polymers, science and engineering?

00:04:07 First of all, to the young people, no matter what their interests are, you're not going

00:04:12 to get anything without working pretty hard for it.

00:04:15 The harder you work for it, the more you're going to enjoy it.

00:04:18 There are no shortcuts.

00:04:20 If you want something, you have to roll up your sleeves and work at it.

00:04:24 And if you begin to do that, you'll find that the working for it is the most enjoyable part

00:04:28 of it, trying to get these things done.

00:04:31 School, you can't get enough of it.

00:04:35 I often say that you reach a point in your life where you stop learning, and that's,

00:04:39 to me, the equivalent of death itself.

00:04:41 You can't learn anymore.

00:04:42 To me, that's brain death.

00:04:46 So I would say, first of all, try to select a field that is something you really want

00:04:51 to do.

00:04:52 Don't be afraid to change.

00:04:53 We all change.

00:04:55 Even get very old in years, you'll still change your career.

00:04:58 Nothing wrong with that.

00:04:59 But try to get into something which you enjoy doing.

00:05:01 It makes all the difference in the world.

00:05:05 Prepare yourself completely for this by the highest level of academic training that you

00:05:10 can get to do the job that you have selected that you want to do.

00:05:14 And you want to make a change.

00:05:16 Don't be afraid to go back and relearn.

00:05:19 One of the things we should learn in school, and it's never really emphasized, is how to

00:05:22 teach yourself.

00:05:25 So you encounter something which is new, and you know how to go back and do your research,

00:05:29 get your background for that new subject.

00:05:31 Think of the instruments, Melton, both you and I, that were developed long since we left

00:05:36 formal college training.

00:05:38 You use them, you make use of the information from them, you've got to go back and restudy

00:05:43 these new fields.

00:05:44 And there, really, it's a case of teaching yourself, not of trying to go back and take

00:05:48 academic courses.

00:05:49 So the ability to teach yourself a new field of work, I think, is very important.

00:05:55 I think youngsters should begin to develop that in their school years.

00:06:01 Everything is changing.

00:06:03 This is a very fluid period in which we're going through.

00:06:06 I am a historian, Bob, you know, among other things.

00:06:09 And I think back when our country, the United States, was an agricultural nation.

00:06:16 We still are.

00:06:17 See, we don't lose these old things.

00:06:19 But we were basically an agricultural nation until World War I.

00:06:23 And curious enough, I have some rather vivid recollections of World War I.

00:06:27 Among other things, now, as I got into chemistry, I realized that's when we first went in that

00:06:30 basic chemical industry.

00:06:32 World War I, we were sort of a supplier, and we got into the heavy chemical industry.

00:06:38 But going from agriculture, I guess, into manufacturing was a big step.

00:06:42 We were following the English tradition of manufacturing nation there.

00:06:46 Now we're going a step further than that.

00:06:48 We're going into the real high-tech era of our development.

00:06:52 And I think there's much for this country to gain in high-tech development.

00:06:57 And this is going to call for materials, going to call for materials which probably we don't

00:07:01 have today, or modifications of things that we have for today.

00:07:06 In the field of polymers, there's going to be much, much done in specialty polymers.

00:07:13 For example, implants within the human body, things which are compatible.

00:07:17 I've done just a little work on that in a consulting basis.

00:07:20 I find it's very challenging, very exciting.

00:07:22 So there'll be some new polymers that we don't know about today.

00:07:25 The big commercial polymers, the ones in which you make tons and tons, probably you aren't

00:07:30 going to see very many new ones coming out, because what else can you do economically

00:07:35 to compete with a polyethylene and a polyvinyl?

00:07:38 However, none of these materials is perfect.

00:07:42 I always say in talking about polymers, they seem to have everything you want, except one

00:07:46 little thing.

00:07:47 Remember the polyethylene?

00:07:48 The polyethylene had everything we needed for the giant, but it just didn't have the

00:07:51 stability.

00:07:52 Well, that's your job.

00:07:53 You make it stable.

00:07:54 You accept the good points, and then you overcome.

00:07:57 That's a good human lesson in learning there, even dealing with people, as you try to modify

00:08:02 and improve the thing which is not quite there.

00:08:04 So I see a lot of work being done on exploring mixtures, for example, blends of polymers,

00:08:11 taking the best advantage of each one, for example.

00:08:15 You may say, just take an example, a polycarbonate might be a very good glazing material for

00:08:23 an automobile, and yet it has certain adverse properties like sensitivity to environmental

00:08:27 stress cracking.

00:08:29 Maybe we want to use a laminate structure, put something over the surface of this glazing

00:08:32 material to stop that adverse reaction, and hence come up with a laminate or a blend structure.

00:08:37 Blends are also quite possible.

00:08:38 There's going to be much done in the polymer field with those areas, but especially polymers

00:08:44 are going to be very exciting because there's so much of that to be done in the medical

00:08:47 field.

00:08:51 So I see nothing but fun.

00:08:52 I wish I could do it all over again.

00:08:53 I had another 50 years to go at it.

00:08:55 Well, you've got a lot.

00:08:56 I hope so.

00:08:57 You've got a lot.

00:08:58 Yes, I hope you do.

00:08:59 I've known you a good many years, and I've seen no obvious deterioration.

00:09:03 Well, you see, because I'm stabilized with antioxidants.

00:09:13 We've stopped.

00:09:14 I don't know.

00:09:15 I don't know.

00:09:16 See, I don't know whether you want to perform a blending.

00:09:18 Oh, he's...

00:09:19 No, I can't see through this lens.

00:09:20 I can't see either.

00:09:21 Okay.

00:09:22 And I can't hear him, so I don't know what he's doing.