Frederick Terman

"It is better to have one seven-foot jumper on your team than any number of six-foot jumpers."

"I most enjoy helping to build something up, taking an unformulated enterprise and making it into what it could become."

"But in the 1950s, many universities saw an advantage in building up all of the sciences and engineering with an eye toward obtaining federal grant money. No single institution did this better than Stanford University. And no one person was more attuned to using federal grants to build a university than its dean of engineering and eventual provost, Frederick Terman. Dr. Terman, trained as an electrical engineer, was an aggressive man with insight and boundless energy. When he began as dean, Stanford University was considered a good private regional school. When he retired as provost, it was arguably the best university for research in the nation."