Measures for Progress: A History of the National Bureau of Standards

54 FOUNDING THE NATIONAL BUREAU OF STANDARDS (1901-10)
In his autobiography, written more than 30 years later, Frank Vander-
lip recalled the event:
In the Coast and Geodetic Survey there was a little sprout of an
organization called the Bureau of Standards [sic]. Previously its
function had been chiefly to serve as the depository of the nation's
standards of weights and measures; although some other things
were done there, the bureau was a puny affair. We wanted a new
head for it and I found myself thinking of one who had been a
close friend of mine at the University of Illinois, a boy named Sam
Stratton. He had become a physicist, and at the University of
Chicago Professor Stratton had come to rank next to Michelson,
the measurer of light. On my recommendation the place was
offered to Sam with the idea that he could develop the bureau into
larger purposes. He was a thorough scientist with a great deal of
imagination and not narrow in any part of him. It is satisfying
even so many years afterward to realize that I had a hand in bring.
ing such a valuable servant into the employ of the government.
That Bureau of Standards grew to its present vast importance
nourished chiefly in its growth by the intelligence of my old col.
lege friend.11
Vanderlip may have called him "Sam," but no one at the Bureau was
ever to approach that degree of familiarity. As a full professor, even with-
out his doctorate, he had the courtesy title of "Doctor," as was customary
then. Later he was awarded six honorary doctorates, the doctor of engi-
neering from Illinois and doctor of science from Pittsburgh in 1903, two more
doctorates of science from Cambridge in 1908 and Yale in 1918; Harvard in
1923 gave him an LL.D., and Rensselaer in 1924 the Ph. D. At the Bureau
he was "Dr. Stratton" to his friends and colleagues, or the "Old Man," among
the frivolous youngsters on the staff, behind his back.
In appearance, Dr. Stratton at 40 was of medium height, mature,
his' sturdy frame and resonant voice commanding authority. He was a
storehouse of specialized knowledge of industrial materials and mechanical
devices of every sort and of 'the latest technical advances in physics and
engineering. He delighted in constructing instruments and apparatus, and
until his administrative duties became all consuming, maintained a private
shop and laboratory near his office. Dr. Stratton never married, and he had
as strong opinions about women in authority at the Bureau as in his home.'2
"Frank A. Vanderlip, with Boyden Sparkes, From Farm Boy to Financier (New York:
D. Appleton-Century, 1935), p. 77.
12 He would not even accept women as clerks and secretaries at the Bureau until forced
by the manpower shortage of World War I.