<Begin Segment 9>

KU: Okay, so I thought I was asking a trivial question, but you're saying it's not trivial, why you chose Caltech over MIT.

BS: Actually, I had written to someone I had met at UC Berkeley in the graduate school, who had gone on to MIT as a faculty member. I wrote to him and asked him his advice as to whether I should choose MIT or Caltech. And he came back with a response saying, "Well, if I were you, I would probably go to MIT because you'll find it to be less rigorous and you will be able to enjoy your life more than coming to MIT." So Agnes and I discussed that, and she said, "I think you should go to Caltech because if you don't go to the school that is more challenging, you'll regret it the rest of your life." So I decided to go to Caltech, even though it might be a harder place to go. That was my response.

KU: Were you glad you did that?

BS: Yeah, I was, actually.

KU: Why?

BS: Because I received an excellent education, and I think that there are many aspects of Caltech that were really enjoyable.

[Interruption]

KU: Can you talk about what major you chose, why you chose the major? Because later on you switched your major.

BS: Well, after I finished my PhD at Caltech, I went to USC to join the Department of Aerospace Engineering. That was interesting because that was before the days of affirmative action, when you had to do all these national searches. My advisor, who was quite famous, called one of his former students who was chair of the Department of Aerospace Engineering and said, "I think you ought to hire Bob. I'll send him over for an interview." So I went there and talked with them, and the next day, I was given an offer to be an assistant professor there. But that's how searches were done, or so-called searches were done back on those days before affirmative action. And so that's how I ended up going to USC. But that was in 1967 when all hell was breaking lose nationwide, riots, assassination, the Watts riot that occurred shortly after that, which wasn't too far from where USC was located. That Watts riot, I think, had a real profound impact on me because I had the reaction, "Well, it's about time they reacted to their oppression and discrimination and racism."

<End Segment 9> - Copyright © 2018 Densho. All Rights Reserved.