June 1991

SPAN A few weeks ago, when he experienced an irregular heartbeat, President George Bush was rushed to the hospital for observation and treatment. At the same time, reporters rushed to their word processors, cameras, and microphones to report every detail of the President's condition that they could learn.

Later President Bush said it was "a little unsettling" to turn on the television and see a reporter "pointing to a diagram of a heart with your name on it." One of the occupational hazards of being President is to have details of your health broadcast far and wide. The availability of such information is one of the things that distinguishes a democracy from an authoritarian regime, where a leader's health, not to mention activities, is often shrouded in secrecy.

Before the White House press corps became so large and aggressive, particularly before the advent of television, a President's personal life was more private. In fact, a few earlier Presidents successfully shielded aspects of their health from the public. For example, during his second term in office President Grover Cleveland (188589, 1893-97) had his left upper jaw removed because of cancer and a prosthetic device inserted in its place. The surgery was carried out in secret on a yacht in the East River off Manhattan in New York. The White House effectively denied press speculation that Cleveland was ill.

The full story was never revealed until 1917, some nine years after the President's death, when one of Cleveland's surgeons described the procedure in an article for The Saturday Evening Post.

President Woodrow Wilson (1913-21) became almost a recluse in the White House for seven months after he suffered a stroke in 1919. Few details of his condition were reported. His wife, Edith, meanwhile, screened all messages to him. Some alleged that she also made decisions in his stead. This she adamantly denied.

More recent Presidents have had no choice but to accept public scrutiny of their maladies.

Dwight Eisenhower's heart attack, John Kennedy's chronic back pains, Lyndon Johnson's gall bladder operation, Richard Nixon's phlebitis, and Ronald Reagan's colon surgery are well remembered because they were so extensively discussed and analyzed by the news media.

Doctors diagnosed President Bush's problem as Graves' disease, a not-so-grave condition, easily treatable with drugs, in which the thyroid gland produces more hormones than normal, speeding up such bodily functions as the heartbeat. The President soon returned to his full schedule, including a visit to Princeton University.

When Princeton's president Harold T. Shapiro introduced him in glowing terms to a convocation of students, Bush remarked, "Your words were so kind that my heart almost went back into fibrillation."

2 America's Top Young Scientists

by Gene Bylinsky

10 Ethics and Business 16 The Short Story Reaches New Heights in America The Story in India

by Bill Oliver

by Aruna Dasgupta

19 In the Garden of the North American Martyrs A Short Story by Tobias Wolff

24

An Environmental Empire by Maury Bates 29 Grouping for Success by Malini Seshadri 33 On the Lighter Side 34 Focus On ...

36 Archives of Architecture 40 A Sense of Direction by Peter A. Quinn 41 Machine Age Art 48 The World According to Disney Front cover: Bonnie Ann Wallace. whose analysis of the structure of a molecule may help find cures for such killer diseases as cystic fibrosis and cancer, stands before a computergenerated image of two molecules. See also pages 2-9.

Publisher, Leonard J. Baldyga; Editor, Guy E. Olson Managing Editor, Himadri Dhanda; Associate Managing Editor, Krishan Gabrani; Senior Editor, Aruna Dasgupta; Copy Editors. A. Venkata Narayana, Snigdha Goswami; Editorial Assistants, Rocque Fernandes, Rashmi Goel; Photo Editor, Avinash Pasricha; Art Director, Nand Katyal; Associate Art Director, Kanti Roy; Artist, Hemant Bhatnagar; Production Assistant. Sanjay Pokhriyal; Circulation Manager, YP. Pandhi; Photographic Services: USIS Photographic Services Unit; Research Services: USIS Documentation' Services; American Center Library, New Delhi.

Photographs: Front cover, 2-9~Louis PsihoyosjMatrix. I6--Jerry Bauer. l7~Mark Katzman. 36-39~Library of Congress, except 37 bottom left by Zigy Kaluzny. 41~ courtesy Dallas Museum of Art, Foundation for the Arts Collection, gift of the artist. 42 left~Hirshhorn Museum & Sculpture Garden, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C. 42-47~AlI pictures courtesy The Brooklyn Museum; 42 center top-private collection; 42 center bottom~gift of the designer; 43~lnternational Museum of Photography at George Eastman House, Rochester, N.Y., bequest of Edward Steichen by direction of Joanna T. Steichen; 44 top left~ The Pace Gallery; 44 center~H. Randolph Lever Fund; 44 bottom~private collection; 45 left~purchased with funds donated by the Walter Foundation; 45 right--eollection of the University Museum, Southern Illinois University at Carbondale, gift of the artist; 46-47~photograph by William Lyall. 48-back cover--eopyright Š 1990 & 1991 The Walt Disney Company.

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AMERICA'S

Text by GENE BYLINSKY Photographs by LOUIS PSIHOYOS-MATRIX

In this age of increasing global competition, American science still sets the pace. According to the U.S. National Science Foundation, Americans invest more in research and development (R&D) than the Japanese, Germans, British, and French combined. And that's not counting military research.

Of the $108,000 million the U.S. spent last year on civilian R&D, industry shelled out $74,000 million to pay for everything from this year's products to pure cogitation at universities and corporate brainpower palaces like Bell Labs.

As the work of the young scientists in the following pages attests, money thus invested pays spectacular dividends-in knowledge today, and other forms of prosperity soon. Fortune magazine chose these men and women from scores of candidates nominated by senior scientists at American universities, corporations, and federal laboratories. All the young scientists have achieved important breakthroughs; several are likely candidates for Nobel Prizes by the year 2000.

Already some of their work has found practical application.

After the discovery of the electron, it took electronics nearly a century to emerge; but today, in fields from biotechnology to quantum

mechanics, the time from lab bench to factory floor seems closer to nanoseconds. Gone is the stand offishness that used to isolate "pure scientists" from technicians; smart corporations are encOUl¡aging both to speed the application of new knowledge.

America continues to act as a magnet for brilliant intellects. Three of the 12 young scientists profiled are natives of other lands. They come for the advanced labs and the stimulation of each other's company: The U.S. scientific and engineering community is nearly a million strong. They come not least because America, unlike more hierarchical societies, offers an environment where scientists can make names for themselves at a tender age. R&D spending keeps rising year after year, and the competition for funds is intense among the battalions of smart baby-boomers hoping to forge the future in the crucible of their minds.

Peter G. Schultz, 34 How to capitalize on body chemistry Berkeley chemist Peter G. Schultz has created a link between biology and commerce that may prove as important as yeast in baking. He showed that antibodies, proteins the immune system makes to flag invaders such as viruses and bacteria, can be harnessed as catalysts to help make chemicals and drugs.

The computer-simulated time sequence seen in the background of his photograph at left illustrates a process he devised: A ye"1lowmolecule, concocted in the lab and injected into the bloodstream of a mouse, stimulates the production of antibodies-the massive red, blue, and purple structures-to be extracted for use as catalysts.

Catalysts have long been a basic tool of the chemist. Nature's most sophisticated catalysts are enzymes, the biological substances crucial to digestion and other life processes. Industry, meanwhile, has relied mainly on catalysts that are chemically less efficient, such as the metals used in making high-test gasoline.

Five years ago Schultz conceived a way to enlist the immune systems of living creatures to generate potent catalysts. He begins by analyzing the structure of a chemical-say, a protein that he wants to cut up. During this cleaving reaction, each molecule of the protein passes through unstable configurations, known as transition states. In a test tube, Schultz creates molecules that mimic these configurations (the yellow molecules shown). Then he injects them into mice, which produce antibodies to fend off the foreign matter. Extracted and purified, the antibodies are powerful catalysts for the cleaving process.

Schultz almost set the house on fire experimenting with chemicals. He was near the top of his class at Caltech, but in his junior year he began to wonder if college was worth the trouble. After a year off, working in an aluminum foundry, he decided to give school another try. He soon embarked on his first major project, an experiment involving enzymes.

With other researchers, Schultz has already produced catalytic antibodies that can speed a millionfold the splitting of esters, basic compounds used in drugmaking. Pharmaceutical companies are racing to develop new drugs using his methods. A spectacular result that may be possible: Medicine to dissolve cholesterol plaques in blood vessels.

Schultz was designated America's outstanding young scientist in 1988 by the National Science Foundation and is an assistant professor at the University of California.

He also works at Affymax, a privately owned Palo Alto, California, company he helped start, which is looking for ways to speed up the discovery of drugs.

Mark A. Reed, 35 Caging an electron With astonishing speed, human beings are gaining mastery over the tiniest manifestations of matter. Physicist Mark A. Reed has succeeded in trapping individual electrons and controlling their actions. His goal: To build computer

memory and logic cells so tiny that more than a thousand million of them would be able to fit in a period on this page.

Three years ago, at Texas Instruments' central research laboratories in Dallas, Texas, he constructed the first so-~alled quantum dot, a box only ten times the diameter of an atom on a side. Beginning with a sandwichlike wafer of gallium arsenide and related materials, he used sophisticated chip-etching techniques to carve thicker towerlike structures. Each tower embodies a quantum dot. By applying a small voltage to the tower, Reed has succeeded in imprisoning a single electron within it.

At that infinitesimal scale, quantum effects reign. Acting less like a particle than like a wave, the electron keeps sloshing inside its quantum cage. Reed can also control the sides of the dot. By applying an electrical potential to one of the walls, he can make it "transparent" to the captured electron so that the electron can exit, or tunnel, into an adjoining quantum dot or be sent elsewhere through a gallium-arsenide structure, which is also called a quantum wire.

The quantum dot can serve as the smallest memory cell ever devised: An electron's presence can stand for a binary 1 or YES; its absence can represent 0 or NO. Many scientists think chips incorporating the dots will make possible the next major leap in electronics. Conventional semiconductor chips, which work by channeling whole flows of electrons, are expected to reach the limits of miniaturization by the end of the decade.

A shift to quantum chips could make possible a plethora of exotic electronic devices-ranging from handheld supercomputers to capacious memory units the size of a walnut.

But while other companies and some American universities already have built rudimentary quantum transistors, no one as yet knows whether quantum chips can be economically mass-produced. For the time being: says Reed, now a professor at Yale, "these structures are miniature laboratories for doing quantum mechanics---they're just tremendous fun."

Bjarne Stroustrup,

39

Making computers work the way people think Growing up in a working-class family in Aarhus, Denmark, Bjarne Stroustrup (above right) was more interested in soccer than schoolwork until a gifted teacher guided him into math. Computers became his passion in college. While he was earning a PhD at Cambridge, his work on software for computer networks caught the eye of recruiters from Bell Labs. In 1979 they asked him to join their famous institution, explaining, in typical Bell Labs fashion, that his salary would be paid for a year and then he would be asked what area he would like to pursue.

A few years later Stroustrup startled the technical world with a programming language, C++, that is fast becoming computing's lingua franca. It is part of a software revolution, known as objectoriented programming, that is going on unbeknownst to ordinary users. Traditionally, programmers took pride in their ability to distill the world's complexities into linear, step-by-step instructions that computers can follow with their blindingly fast but simple brains. That approach has led to soaring costs and long delays in the creation of large programs, such as those that control the switching of phone calls. Object-oriented programming, in contrast, vastly simplifies human interaction with the machine by making computers work more the way people think. It gives the programmer sets of tools that he or she can readily manipulate.

Say a programmer wants to create a new type of "window" for framing data on the screen. Doing so in a traditional language would mean writing complex a simand lengthy commands. In C++ ple command, OPEN A WINDOW, causes the machine to call up other windows that have been defined previously; the new window automatically inherits their attributes, and the programmer customizes it by varying a few. The details remain hidden from the programmer's view, much as the intricacies of weaving and dyeing cloth are hidden from a tailor.

Says Stroustrup: "What I deal in is control of complexity."

Little wonder that the use of C++ is doubling every eight months. It has been used to program a wide range of machines, from supercomputers to lowly PCs (a retail version of C++ costs less than $100 in America). It helped make' possible the versatile graphics of Apple's Macintosh line and has worked its way into products from Hewlett-Packard and Sun Microsystems.

But what delights Stroustrup most is the rapid spread of C++ in developing countries. He gets fan mail from Hunan and inquiries from South America, and his book on C++ is being translated into Serbo-Croatian.

A key to its appeal, he explains, is that C++ runs much more efficiently than other sophisticated languages on ordinary personal computers: "It's in essence low tech. You no longer need a superduper workstation to do superduper work."

Marc R. Montminy,

34

A chemical key to mental disorders The brain is an electrochemical caldron where billions of neurons fire tiny electrical pulses. The chemicals that carry and modulate those pulses govern our health, our emotions, and our thoughts in ways science is only beginning to understand.

In his lab at the Salk Institute in LaJolla, California, Marc R. Montminy has analyzed the production of a key brain chemical, somatostatin.

Too much somatostatin has been linked to dwarfism and anorexia nervosa, the compulsive refusal to eat; too little is associated with clinical depression and the devastating symptoms of Alzheimer's disease.

By studying genes within brain cells, Montminy showed how stimuli-such as the everyday act of drinking coffee-can help activate a DNA segment that in turn initiates somatostatin production.

The gene is turned on and off by a kind of molecular switch-a molecule that straddles the DNA and blocks it from working, somewhat like the Denver boot that police use to immobilize a scofflaw's car.

Montminy has analyzed the switch (a

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map of the molecule appears behind him in the photograph at right) and shown how it can be locked and unlocked chemically, knowledge that may speed the search for an Alzheimer's cure.

Montminy's work could lead to other new medicines, even for the common cold. Switches like those he discovered occur in cold and other types of viruses.

By developing drugs that replace those switches with defective ones-locks that won't open-science may be able to prevent cold viruses from reproducing.

Growing up in Lewiston, Maine, .

Montminy wanted to be a doctor. He remembers borrowing a blood pressure cuff from his mother, a nurse, at age eight and taking it to school to show his classmates. He studied medicine at Tufts University in Medford, Massachusetts,

but later switched to neurochemistry in the belief that he could help more people by doing research. That may prove spectacularly right.

Sharon R. Long, 39 Why plants talk Sharon R. Long has shown an uncanny ability to use the tools of one discipline to solve mysteries in another. Like several of Fortune's top scientists, she switched fields early in her career, moving into molecular genetics after mastering chemistry and development biology at Caltech, Yale, and Harvard. Today she is an associate professor of biology at Stanford.

Each year the world's farmers spread nearly 80 million tons of nitrogen fertilizer on their crops to jump-start growth.

Long's research may make it possible to start weaning agriculture off the fertilizer habit by equipping major food crops with microscopic fertilizer factories. A few crops, such as soybeans and alfalfa, already make their own fertilizer by working symbiotically with a bacterium called rhizobium. The bacteria, which reside in nodules in the plants' roots, extract nitrogen from the air-something the plant can't do-and supply it to the plant as ammonia, the version of nitrogen that plants use for growth. In exchange, the plants provide the bacteria a place to stay and nourish them with sugars produced through photosynthesis.

The process by which the plant locates rhizobium bacteria in the soil and forms nodules they can inhabit involves chemical communication between bacterium and plant. Charting the details of that conversation could be the first step in getting crops such as corn, wheat, and rice to develop the ability to nourish themselves. Using imaginative combinations of molecular biology and electrophysiology, Long is decoding the rhizobiumalfalfa conversation. Four years ago she and her colleagues found the signal from the plant that starts the dialogue. It turned out to be a molecule of f1avonoid-a bright yellow substance that ancient Romans used as a dye. The message it sends to the bacteria, in es¡

sence: "Rhizobium, come to work!"

In response, Long recently proved, rhizobium near the alfalfa roots emit a chemical signal of their own. They tell the plant: "We got your message and we're on our way. Start preparing nodules."

Says Long: "I like to think of it as a dialogue in a play. We've got the scenery.

We've got the first sentence. We've got the second sentence. Now we want to know the reply. We'll see if the third sentence leads to a lot of furniture rearrangement."

Eventually, genes that enable plants to hold such dialogues could be inserted into crops that don't make nodules for rhizobium now. That, in turn, could change the face of agriculture.

Bonnie Ann Wallace, 39 The gates of the cell Killer maladies such as cystic fibrosis, cancer, and heart disease are thought to disrupt the pumping of nutrients and other substances through the walls of the body's cells. The apparently simple question of how this flow works baffled researchers for generations.

In 1988, Bonnie Ann Wallace found the solution by analyzing in exquisite detail the structure of a molecule that works as a supply channel in a cell wall. She mapped each of its 520 atoms and 602 atomic bonds, and also discovered that the molecule opens and closes a passage through its center by changing shape. (Two such molecules appear behind Wallace in the computergenerated image on the front cover.)

Wallace likens the molecule to a Chinese finger puzzle. When it is letting in nourishment, it becomes short and squat, allowing electrically charged particles known as ions to pass through the hole in its center. At other times it becomes long and thin so the hole is too narrow for ions to pass.

Even as a small girl in Greenwich, Connecticut, Wallace always wanted to know how things worked. She was so impressive as a high school chemist that a teacher allowed her to do experiments her own way. She graduated from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, New York,

earned a PhD at Yale, and eventually returned to Rensselaer as a professor.

For her study of ion channels she chose gramicidin, an early antibiotic that has fallen into relative disuse because it produces serious side effects when taken internally. Applying a battery of techniques from X-ray diffraction to infrared spectroscopy, Wallace and her colleagues traced cesium ions passing through molecules of the drug.

An immediate benefit of Wallace's research may be to rehabilitate gramicidin as an antibiotic for general use. The drug works by puncturing holes in bacteria, allowing ions to escape so the bacteria deflate like balloons; its side effects derive, apparently, from an unfortunate tendency to wreak similar havoc on human cells. Wallace and her associates are trying to make the drug more selective in what it kills.

Hundreds of other channel molecules beckon to be investigated. Cystic fibrosis, a congenital disease that afflicts 17,009 Americans, recently has been found to result from a poorly regulated flow of chloride ions into the cells of the lungs.

Understanding how the disease sabotages channel molecules may eventually lead researchers to a cure.

Susan Solomon, 34 Solving the riddle of the ozone hole As a ten-year-old growing up in a middle-class Chicago neighborhood, Susan Solomon remembers being entranced by Jacques Cousteau's televised adventures

[which were also serialized on Indian television some years ago]. "I decided right then that science was the most wonderful thing you could do in the world," says Solomon. Now her work in chemistry is bringing her to the question of life's survival on Earth.

In 1985, Solomon was a researcher at the u.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in Boulder, Colorado, when scientists detected an ozone hole over the South Pole. This is a gap in the atmosphere's ozone layer, located between the altitudes of 32,000 and 74,000 feet [9,750 meters and 22,550 meters], which normally shields the Earth from the sun's ultraviolet radiation. Even in moderate doses, such radiation can cause skin cancer; unblocked by the atmosphere, it would wipe out life on Earth.

"The discovery was a tremendous shock," Solomon remembers. "We had been predicting a five percent to ten percent ozone depletion in 50 to 100 years.

All of a sudden we were observing a 50 percent depletion."

Scientists suspected the damage was caused by chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), man-made gases widely used in refrigerators, aerosol cans, and the making of semiconductors. But the process by which so much ozone disappeared was a mystery. Like many chemists around the world, Solomon spent months on the problem.

The critical insight hit her at a lecture in San Francisco on polar stratospheric clouds. Until then, these airborne formations of ice crystals were little more than a scientific curiosity whose iridescent beauty gave them the nickname motherof-pearl clouds. But as the lecturer flashed slides of the cloud layer, recalls Solomon, "I suddenly started thinking, 'Those clouds are much more extensive in Antarctica than anywhere else; what if ozone depletion takes place when CFC derivatives react on the cloud surfaces?'''

She organized an expedition to Antarctica to gather data; the trip and other experiments brought confirmation for her theory within a year. Industrialized nations soon began regulating CFC use, and in 1989 Solomon received the U.S.

Department of Commerce's gold medal for "impeccable science in the cause of humankind."

Lately she has shifted her attention to the Arctic, where ozone depletion may threaten the Northern Hemisphere.

Although the ozone layer is constantly replenished in the atmosphere, this happens at a ¡rate far too slow to compensate for damage done by man. The only solution, Solomon believes, is virtual prohibition of the offending chemicals, and she praises recent efforts by chemical manufacturers to develop CFC substitutes.

Paul A. Bottomley, 37 A new window into the body One afternoon in 1977, after months of preparation, Paul A. Bottomley stuck his arm into an experimental nuclear magnetic resonance machine. The technology had been developed for chemical analysis, but the young physicist and his co-workers believed it could be used as a window into the human body. He proved that by producing a vivid cross section of his left wrist on the display of a computer hooked to the machine.

A native of Melbourne, Australia, who started out in chemistry and switched to physics, Bottomley did the experiment at England's Nottingham University. The following year he moved to the United States in search of a broader scientific community, better equipment, and a higher salary. After two years at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, he joined General Electric's research and development center in Schenectady, New York. By 1982 he and his colleagues had built a magnetic resonance machine powerful enough to produce high-resolution images of the human head. When the machine was switched on, it made images so much better than expected- that the ordinarily laconic Bottomley couldn't contain his enthusiasm. He recalls: "I got so excited that I grabbed a cleaning man by the shoulders in the hallway and dragged him in to look."

Today massive machines for magnetic resonance imaging, or MRI, let doctors

see into the body and diagnose disease without surgery, X-rays, or the injection of radioactive dye. Meanwhile, Bottomley has pioneered what is known as magnetic resonance spectroscopy. His goal is to reveal the body's living chemistry, extending MRI technique to record not only physical features within the body but also biochemical changes that accompany-and sometimes precede-the symptoms of disease.

In 1985, Bottomley led a team that produced the first such analysis of the beating heart. The procedure revealed both the organ itself and details of its chemistry by tracing the distribution of chemical by-products of the heart's exertions. Such information may allow cardiologists to spot regions of the heart damaged by a heart attack and to monitor the effect of heart medications that on the organ's metabolism-action can't easily be observed with other diagnostic techniques. Using the same method, oncologists may be able to monitor tumors to gauge the effectiveness of cancer drugs.

Both imaging and spectroscopy are accomplished with the same MRI machine, which surrounds the patient with huge magnets. So powerful is the magnetic field that the nuclei of atoms in the patient's body line up parallel to it. A coil in the machine then jolts the nuclei with high-frequency radio waves, causing them to resonate like infinitesimal tuning forks. They produce a faint radio signal that is amplified, recorded, and translated into an image or a diagnostic chart. Medical spectroscopy is just beginning to find its way into clinical experiments, but when it is perfected and its findings better understood, it could usher in an age of nearly instantaneous diagnosis.

Donald M. Eigler, 37 The man who moves atoms Around 400 B.C. the Greek philosopher Democritus postulated the existence of an ultimate "uncuttable" particle of matter he named the atom. It has taken 24 centuries for human beings to actually seize one and move it. Physicist Donald

M. Eigler did, at IBM's Almaden Research Center in San Jose, California, last November. Not only has he succeeded at moving individual atoms but he has also begun to assemble them in primitive structures.

Eigler used a Nobel Prize-winning IBM invention, the scanning tunneling electron microscope. That remarkable instrument, perfected in the early 1980s, made atoms on surfaces clearly visible for the first time. It works by positioning a fine metal probe next to the material under observation. A weak voltage applied between the tip and the material causes electrons to flow between the two; tunneling refers to the quantum mechanical process by which the electrons cross the gap. As the tip is moved along the surface, it reveals the contours of the atoms below.

Scientists suspected that the microscope could be used to rearrange atoms.

In 1987 a team at AT&T's Bell Laboratories reported having moved a germanium atom inadvertently picked up by the microscope tip. But they were unable to control the phenomenon, in part because atoms at room temperature are too energetic for the microscope to grab-they literally jump away. Eigler, meanwhile, modified a microscope to operate in a vacuum at temperatures near absolute zero, conditions under which atoms are tamer.

The project took five years; he says his knack for building things derives from childhood training by his father, an aerospace engineer.

The experiment involved a platinum sheet that had been exposed to the heavy gas xenon. The microscope revealed xenon atoms scattered on the platinum like soccer balls on a frozen playing field. Eigler found that he could reposition the atoms, one by one, by moving the microscope tip close and dragging them along.

His first application of the technique was pure showmanship: He arranged 35 atoms to spell out the IBM logo in letters one-500,OOOth the size of those on this page. Next he created the first man-made atomic cluster, seven xenon atoms bound

in a row by shared electrons. Ultimately, atoms may serve as building blocks for ultrasmall electronic circuits; Eigler is inching toward such a feat by teaching himself to assemble simple molecules, such as those of carbon dioxide, an atom at a time.

Michael H. Freedman, 38 Master of dimensions Math wizard Michael H. Freedman hated numbers in school. "I resented them as being artificial and getting in the way," he says. His great gift, the ability to thirtk geometrically rather than numerically: led to a historic breakthrough in topology that won him the National Medal of Science and a fiveyear "genius grant" from the MacArthur Foundation.

Topology is sometimes called "rubber sheet geometry." It is the branch of pure mathematics that deals with the qualities of objects rather than their sizes and shapes: Topologists study features that

can't be lost if an object is stretched, twisted, or otherwise deformed. In this way of looking at the world, a doughnut and a coffee cup are the same because each has only one hole.

A goal of topology is to classify multidimensional surfaces, which practitioners call manifolds. Everyday forms, such as spheres, can exist in any number of dimensions: To imagine what is meant by an eight-dimensional sphere, think of a golf ball, and add to its usual three dimensions measures for its age, color, temperature, weight, and bounciness. (The photograph below shows Freedman sitting in front of a computer rendition of a doughnut in four-dimensional, or 4-D, space.)

A century ago the great French mathematician Henri Poincare devised a clever way to classify manifolds.

He would imagine a loop of string on the surface and determine how far the loop could be shrunk. On a sphere, for instance, any loop can shrink to a point; but on a doughnutlike torus, a loop that encircles

the hole can't shrink smaller than the hole's circumference. Hence, the sphere and the torus are said to belong to different groups.

Three-dimensional manifolds are a special headache for topologists. They can be stretched and folded so many ways that no one has been able to classify them.

In 1904, Poincare outlined a set of simple tests and challenged colleagues to prove that any three-dimensional manifold, no matter how distorted, is a sphere if it satisfies the tests. This challenge is called the Poincare conjecture; paradoxically, mathematicians were able to prove it only for spheres of five dimensions or more.

Freedman was the first to create a proof for four-dimensional spheres. Part of his reasoning: One should be able to shrink to a point not only loops but also twodimensional spheres embedded in the 4-0 manifold. The work consumed seven years; while his discovery has no concrete application as yet, Freedman, a professor at the University of California at San Diego, says: "All mathematics has practical potential." Example: Knot theory, a branch of topology devoted to classifying knots. Long thought arcane, it is now hugely important to biochemists. They use it to explain how strands of DNA that lie jumbled like garden hose in the nuclei of living cells can divide without getting hopelessly snarled.

Rodney A. Brooks, 35

Brooks created a huge stir in the robotics world by taking as his model not humans but the humble insect. Insects rely on their brains far less than higher species; they jump, crawl, and respond to environmental stimuli by using other parts of their nervous systems that work almost autonomously.

The nerves typically run along the underside of the creature's body; to complement them, nature equips insects with widely distributed sensors, including "ears" in such bizarre places as the abdomen, as in grasshoppers and moths, and on the front legs, as in crickets.

With help from students, Brooks has imitated this distributed intelligence in some of the smallest robots built. His sixlegged, foot-long [30 centimeters] robot, named Genghis, creeps toward human visitors in the MIT lab after spotting them with infrared eyes. It detects obstacles in its path with antennalike whiskers, and clambers over them by "feeling" them with sensors in its legs.

Brooks envisions building hordes of tiny, low-cost robots to tackle specialized tasks, such as scouring barnacles off the hulls of ships or fanning out across the plains of Mars as scientific scouts. Minute robots might be injected into the bloodstream to perform surgery from within.

A wacky dream? Entrepreneur/businessman Ross Perot, for one, doesn't think so.

He set up Gnat Robot Corporation to help Brooks's wee automatons establish a beachhead in the market.

Hordes of tiny robots If modern electronics is so advanced, why have the robotic butlers and cooks that have been predicted for decades failed to materialize? Rodney A. Brooks, an Australia-born associate professor of computer science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), thinks robotics engineers have been on the wrong track. They've been trying to build machines in the human image: Robots with a computer for a brain, an electronic vision system for eyes, and arms and legs all centrally coordinated. Such machines have proved too costly and slow-witted to be applied beyond simple, repetitive tasks such as welding cars.

Alan Dressler, 42 On the trail of the Great Attractor He became hooked on astronomy as a five-year-old boy, the moment he saw the majestic rings of Saturn through a telescope in Cincinnati's Hyde Park. Now a staff astronomer at the Carnegie Observatories in Pasadena, California, Alan Dressler is shaking up conventional astronomical wisdom.

In the nearby Andromeda galaxy, he helped locate a black hole, a celestial abyss that sucks in light and matter like a cosmic vacuum cleaner. Then, in 1986, he and his team discovered an ob-

ject that is like something straight out of science fiction. The Great Attractor is a mass of dark matter, unimaginably large, 200 million light-years from Earth. The Attractor is invisible-it makes its presence known only through its immense gravitational tug on galaxies. Our home galaxy, the Milky Way, is one of thousands in its grip.

This finding raises important questions about the Big Bang, the huge explosion believed to have started the universe.

Cosmologists, who study its origin, have long assumed that the Big Bang spread matter smoothly across the heavens. Now Dressler has demonstrated the universe to be lumpy, like oatmeal. "There must be an element of the Big Bang we don't understand," he says. "It seems unlikely that the universe could have gone from smooth to its current state. For something as vast as the Great Attractor to have formed, either the primordial cosmos had larger structures than we previously thought, or the universe has taken longer to evolve."

Dressler's discovery was based on years of work, with colleague Sandra Faber, at Carnegie's Las Campaiias Observatory high in the Andes Mountains of Chile. The air at the remote site is so clear, says Dressler, that one can read a newspaper by the light of the Milky Way. Clearly visible overhead are the galaxy's millions of stars, deep dark rifts, and objects such as the Eta Carina nebula. Dressler says the sight can transfix an observer: "It becomes an emotional experience."

What moves him most profoundly, however, is not the spectacle of the heavens but the human mind: "Most people are awed by the size of the universe and our being so small. My view is completely opposite. The mind is the most complex thing we know of --complexity resides not out there but here, in our biology and our minds. The marvelous thing is that we can discover, understand, and contemplate the universe."

0 About the Author: Gene Bylinsky, who is on the Board of Editors of Fortune magazine, has won several awards for his scientific reporting.

Ethics and Business The authors say that every decision managers make must be based on a strict code of ethics to ensure fairness to all. For this they must ask themselves and honestly answer some specific questions.

Many companies have adopted codes or standards of ethical behavior. Some of these codes are very specific.

Unfortunately, well-intentioned companies may actually hinder the development of management's moral character by too much attention to rules and too little attention to questions. In particular, no rule can answer the question: "If I can get away with it and profit by it, why worry about whether it is ethical?" We suggest a supplement to ethics training for managers: An ethics checklist.

Steelcase, America's largest maker of office furniture, showed a profit in 1987of $I20 million from sales of $1,600 million. It offers for wages a base pay of $8 or $9 per hour.

Yet Steelcase is not unionized, and it flaunts a low annual rate ofturnover among its workers-as low as three percent.

How does Steelcasedo it? Robot workers? Zombies? No. A climate of cooperation between and among workers and management prevails at Steelcase. It gains the loyalty of its workers by showing a rare flexibility in how it allots pay, hours, and benefits. The interests of the workers are tied to those of the company through profit-sharing bonuses; incentives, being a large part of the wages, keep productivity high. Workers with erratic lifestyles may select eccentric schedules. Thus workers, particularly working mothers, are absent less often. By being able to choose between eight medical plans, three dental plans, and other options, workers have an enormous say in how they are compensated for their work.

But look at Kaiser Cement. After tough bargaining in 1984, the management at the Cushenberry, California, plant wrangled some 260 major concessions from labor.

Management claimed this as a great success. A mere three months and 4,000 grievances later, management found itself with a growing heap of sabotaged equipment and a sullen labor force that refused to work overtime.

Whereas harmony reigns at Steelcase, a climate of Reprinted

from Business Horizons.

MarchjApril199O.

the School of Business at Indiana University.

Copyright

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Used with permission.

1990 by. the Foundalion

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distrust and resistance prevailed at Kaiser. The interests of labor and management at Kaiser did not coincide. An "us versus them" attitude tore the company apart. In A Great Place to Work (1988), Robert Levering, speaking generally about the "trust reservoir" of companies, says, "The erosion of trust can be seen as the root of various other pathologies-such as higher levels of personal stress and lower productivity." Clearly, trust at Kaiser eroded.

A climate does not appear suddenly. It comprises countlessevents, attitudes, policies,and beliefs.Every decision, no matter how trivial, forms a part of the prevailing climate.

According to Levering "[trust is] the product of what has happened within the workplace over time. In this regard, trust in workplace relationships is not different from trust in personal relationships. Certain acts seem to add to the quantity of trust we feel toward another person, while other acts reduce it." Thus, no single act will transform a Kaiserclimate into a Steelcase-climate overnight, but a single act could be a symbolic turning of the tide.

A company is not just a charter, nor is it just a group of people, nor is it the sum of capital assets, nor is it any earning power. A front cannot be a company, nor can a crime ring be, nor a scam. Stripped of all trappings, a company is a moral climate created for a worthy purpose.

Many companies have ethical codes, some of which are quite extensive. Some of the best are those of Boeing, GTE, Hewlett-Packard, Johnson & Johnson, and the Norton Company. But ethical codes are usually either too vague or too detailed for practical use.

Glaucon and the modern company So exactly what are the hallmarks of good companies?

How can a "moral climate" be distinguished from any other climate?

From the inside, one can tell good companies by the way they are bound together by mutual trust and cooperation.

From the outside, one can spot a good company by the way

folks who organize things so that work done by one part of the organization can be used effectively by another part."

A manager is also an ethical link between labor, shareholders, suppliers, and customers. Whether meaning to do so or not, each manager sets an example for the rest of the company with his or her every action. The manager, in normal day-to-day activity, indirectly teaches others what is forbidden, what is condoned, and what is required. A manager, therefore, is a showcase for the company.

To see how important even a seemingly insignificant decision can be, consider a rule that might be made by Ed, a vice president of a small engineering firm. Suppose he issued an edict, in the form of a memo, to his staff: "No smoking in the building-ever." He sought no second opinion, and listened to no complaints. "Smoking is its actions and advertisements seem to say "we will be unhealthy," he reasoned, "not only for smokers but also around forever." Acting as if one will be around forever is for nonsmokers. There are all too many smoking breaks, and they last far too long. Lit cigarettes are fire hazards. A a sign that one is acting ethically.

In The Republic, Plato dealt with the key question: Is ajust staff of nonsmokers costs less to insure."

Ed's reasons were fine, as far as they went, but he forgot life any better than an unjust one? In that dialogue, the students who had gathered around Socrates ventured sev- that dealing brusquely with employees always spawns eral feeble reasons, most of which assumed that justness negative side-effects. He overlooked the hidden cost of alwaysled to pleasure, whileinjusticeled to pain. Glaucon, a enforcing this new rule. For example, he forgot the passive more cynical character, was not convinced. He asked resistance he would incite from some of his staff. Already Socrates to imagine a case in which the results were not so facing an underground defiance for similar edicts, he could happy. Suppose an unjust man had a magic ring that made ill afford to make an example of anyone. He also underestihim invisible, and a just man had another ring like it. The mated how much time surveillance would take. But, he just man, being modest, would perform good actions and knew that if he failed to strictly enforce his new rule, his take no credit, whereas the unjust man would do evilwith no staff would start thinking of him as ineffective. blame. Glaucon then wondered what would make justice A no-smoking rule cc>Uldseem unfair to one's staff. The better than injustice, ifjustness led to poverty while injustice work of heavy smokers could deteriorate. Even light led to riches and pleasure. In modern guise, Glaucon's smokers would be on edge. Tension would increase. The challengeis: "If a person could lie,cheat, and steal and never whole staff would resent the fact that only the shareholdbe caught, why would he or she ever be honest?" ers benefit, while the employees, smoking and nonGlaucon's challenge is faced every day by millions of smoking alike, suffer in different ways. business people. The argument is very persuasive. In fact, But what if Ed's staff netted some of the benefits? some would say it cannot be refuted without religion. Suppose some of the money saved on health and fire Although we willnot answer the challenge, we can make use insurance went into employee perks. Would they have of it. When people talk themselves into unethical acts, they been with him or against him? Ifthe¡continuance of these do so by pretending that there are no consequences to suffer. perks had depended on how well his staff policed itself, Ed Some people refuse to even think about the consequences, would have to spend little time on enforcement. If the some conveniently forget them, and some engage in wishful issue had been presented to the whole staff, many soluthinking. From nibbling a candy bar to embezzlinga million tions would have been proposed that Ed might never have dollars, a temptation is only as great as its cost is small. considered. Working together with Ed, the whole team would be united by a common goal.

Thoughtful managers personify company values Clearly, even minor decisions may affect employees in When we said that a company is good only if it acts as if seemingly infinite ways. Likewise, daily decisions affect it will be around forever, we meant that the actions of a suppliers, shareholders, customers, and the public at good company clearly show the managers to be always, large. How can a busy manager foresee enough potential thinking about long-range consequences. In contrast, problems, stemming from his or her proposed actions, to companies with mistreated workers, bad credit, poor make informed, ethical decisions? customer service, or environmental problems are usually Recently, business ethic~ has become a topic of little also companies with no real hopes for the future. debate and much concern. Business ethics generates little "Managers," says Levering, "act as coordinators-the debate because everyone agrees that business people

should act ethically. Ethics, however, is a topic of much concern, because business people like Ed make everyday decisions that are fraught with moral implications.

Yet one question that has resisted easy answers is: "How can a company best train its managers to be moral?" Simply offering a list of rules to memorize will not create moral managers, because no number of rules and policies will add up to a single good act. By the same token, no book of restrictions and guidelines can treat every problem that will arise. Thus, even well-intent!oned managers will make mistakes when they confront real problems that are not covered by company policy. Moral action requires a knowledge of all the alternatives, foresight into all the consequences, and two things for which few people have the time: Practice and review.

We feel that the keystone to solid moral thinking lies not in having all the answers, but in asking productive questions. According to Tad Tuleja, author of Beyond the Bottom Line: How Business Leaders Are Turning Principles into Profits (1985), "Human judgment is notori-

ously unstable, but moral attitude-what some ethicists call 'moral character'-is not. Ethical judgment consists not in getting the right answer all the time, but in consistently asking the right questions." Thus, we suggest that companies interested in the ethical instruction of managers not rely exclusively on general laws engraved in stone tablets, but supplement their rules with a checklist of specific, easy-to-apply questions designed to provoke the type of thinking that usually guides an ethical act.

A checklist for evaluating managerial decisions There is no substitute for experience and time. Harried managers, however, must have a way to streamline their ethical thinking. By honestly answering the questions in the box (above right), managers can bring into relief the underlying moral structure of a decision.

This checklist draws attention to some of the more common causes of unethical decisions. A check in the "yes" column suggests the proposed decision be either changed or discarded. At a minimum, a "yes" means that more care is needed than with decisions scoring all "no"s.

What this checklist does not do is give pat responses to tough problems. Positive solutions always require ingenuity, imagination, and insight. A perfect score will not guarantee the "rightness" of a decision, but it improves the chances of its being ethical. Managers must add their own questions to the list, as their companies, experiences, and personalities dictate.

Bringing the checklist into focus What kinds of productive thoughts might be stimulated by this checklist? Here, in addition to a fuller explanation of what is meant by each checklist question, are some practical examples.

Question #1: "Does my decision treat me, or my

1. "Does my decision treat me, or my company, as an exception to a convention that I must trust others to follow?"

Yes

No

2. "Would I repel customers by telling them?"

3. "Would I repel qualified job applicants by telling them?"

4. "Have I been cliquish?"

(If "Yes," answer questions 4a through 4c.

If "No," skip to question 5.)

4a. "Is my decision partial?"

4b. "Does it divide the constituencies of the company?"

4c. "Will I have to pull rank (use coercion) to enact it?"

5. "Would I prefer to avoid the consequences of this decision?"

6. "Did I avoid any of the questions by telling myself that I could get away with it?"

company, as an exception to a convention that I must trust others to follow?" If the answer is "yes," there could be ethical problems. Perhaps there are alternatives that do not flout conventions. The smooth functioning of business and society depends on everyone conforming to thousands of rules, both written and unwritten. Diverse examples of conventions are: Taking turns, asking permission to smo.ke in another person's room, being punctual for appointments, parking in proper parking spaces, following through on promises, telling the truth, respecting the property of others, and obeying the law.

The most common source of unethical acts is the temptation to think of oneself as special. Every wrong can be seen as a case of twisting around a well-known tradition, practice, etiquette, protocol, strategy, technique, rule, or law so that it works against those people who abide by it. For example, only when people form orderly lines can someone gain an advantage by cutting into line. Only if honesty is the norm can lying succeed.

Sam, the president of a small company that develops computer software, is bidding on a contract-a billing program for a local hospital. He faces a choice about timeliness: He could promise a delivery date that is either realistic or overly optimistic. He fears that a realistic promise would lose the contract. He knows that if he overstates and wins, the truth will only come out when it is too late for the hospital to switch to another software company. What should he do? Can he get away with underestimating the time needed to complete the task?

The first question on the checklist would force Sam to think twice about misrepresenting his service. Truthtelling is perhaps the most commonly assumed convention in the business world. If Sam were to lie, even if he

believes that winning the contract is the only way to meet his payroll this month, he would show contempt for business tradition.

Because Sam is the president of his company, his actions set an example for everyone else. If Sam's overstatement is taken to heart by the rest of his company, some people will follow his lead and make their own hyperbolic promises to him. Sam will soon discover that when he exaggerates the already exaggerated claims of others his projections are impossible to fulfill.

Suppose the checklist had made Sam notice that his proposed method of winning the bid was unethical. He might then have realized that his false promises would guarantee customer dissatisfaction.

Ethics aside, if he realized how badly this would violate the marketing concept, he might have taken the time to work out another approach. Knowing that few software companies are known for timeliness, he could try to make a name for his company by always delivering a superior product when promised. He could have told the hospital administrators the most probable delivery schedule. If they insisted that he work as fast as one of his competitors claimed to work, he could agree to do so for a premium that would cover the cost of engaging subcontractors.

Some people feel that the world of business is cutthroat, that what people normally call treachery is nothing more than "business savvy." These people might argue that being deceitful, far from making them exceptions to any rule, puts them right in line with standard business practice.

Even if one grants the (false) claim that deceit is rampant in the business world, to argue this way is to confuse a common practice with a convention. There is no convention forcing people to steal, even though theft is common. Bad grammar is the norm; good grammar is the convention. Thus, if one is tempted to avoid the first question by pointing out that "all the others do it," one should ask whether "all the others" are following a rule or breaking one.

Question #2: "Would I repel customers by telling them?" If the answer is "yes" -that is, if a news story exposing the decision would lower profits-it is appropriate to rethink the decision. One should always be suspicious of any act that must be kept quiet. The impending danger is not the obvious consequence that the secret might leak out, but rather the easy-to-ignore consequences of secrecy becoming standard.

This checklist question is similar to but goes far beyond the marketing concept. The marketing concept tells us that the consumer is king: Every decision must be made with the goal of profitably satisfying the needs of the consumer in mind. The marketing concept, unfortunately, does not say anything about decisions that may be hidden from the consumer.

Many consumers of foodstuffs are just as concerned

with the social history as with the physical chemistry of the product. For example, among many Californians, the demand for some produce varies with the working conditions of the migrant farm hands. For another example, many vegetarians, while having no general qualms about eating flesh, nonetheless boycott commercial meats in protest of the treatment livestock typically suffers in the cote and the abattoir. These examples show that manufacturers must think of ethics as an additive.

Many times, the answer to Question #2 will be: "I'm not ashamed of the decision. In fact, it saves the customers money. But, because some people might take it the wrong way, I would hate to see it splashed across the front page of The New York Times."

If a manager answers in this way, perhaps the decision needs more thought. If only the cleverest and subtlest arguments can salvage a decision, the arguments against it are probably far stronger.

In 1977, Parker Brothers, at a cost of $8.3 million, withdrew a highly successful plastic riveting toy, called Riviton, from the market after two children strangled on the plastic rivets. The toy had been carefully tested, the U.S. Consumer Products Safety Commission had ruled that the toy was safe, and both deaths were the result of obvious misuse. The decision to withdraw the toy would easily pass Question #2, because it would be unlikely that revenue would be lost by publicizing the decision. A decision to keep selling the toy would not fare so well.

Question #3: "Would I repel qualified job applicants by telling them?" If the answer is "yes," the decision may be unethical. Decisions that would repel the best workers are decisions that hurt the company. For example, conscientious cooks would be wary of working in a restaurant where the manager recently fired a waiter for telling the local press about major health violations.

Steelcase has much to offer a new employee. Interviewers could freely discuss company policies at job interviews. At Kaiser Cement, interviewers of job applicants had best confine themselves to asking questions and avoid giving specific facts about working conditions.

Many former business practices have been outlawed because of the displeasure they cause workers. Other practices, while not strictly illegal, are commonly barred by larger corporations. For example, dismissal ofwhistleblowers is illegal. Short of dismissal, however, there are many levels of harassment open to managers. Question #3 should sow seeds of doubt in any manager tempted to discourage or punish honesty.

Nepotism, as another example, carries a message to all members of the firm: "Hard work will get you nowhere."

Of all the messages a manager could send to the staff, this one makes the least sense.

Levering points out that destructive, internal politicking "is fostered whenever someone is fired (or demoted) for what appears to others in the company to be a

personality conflict rather than deficiencies in work performance. Such episodes teach a powerful lesson to others-that personal loyalty is the supreme virtue."

Question #4: "Have I been cliquish?" If the answer is "yes," the manager may not have a broad enough perspective to make an ethical choice. How many opinions are enough? It depends. In a small research firm, five opinions may be more than enough; in a large chemical company, a thousand opinions may be far from enough.

Just as the definition of cliquish will differ from one company to another, so too will the methods of obtaining feedback. However Question #4 is best phrased for a particular company, the guiding principle is clear: When fewer people are involved, important issues are more likely to be overlooked.

Says a manager at Mattei Toys, "Ours is a very open company. The most ethical decisions at Mattei are the ones that make the rounds of the whole firm. Decisions directly vary in quality with the number of people involved in making them. When enough people set their minds to work, many bad decisions-what you might call the 'unethical' ones-get weeded out, not so much for moral reasons (at least not on the surface), but because there is always an economically better way."

The reaSon it works this way is simple. When one person does something for the good of a group, we say he or she is acting morally.

But when many people elect to do the same something for themselves, we say they are acting solely in their own self-interest.

Thus, any action undertaken by a manager with the approval of a large enough group is automatically moral.

There are two times when company-wide input is impossible or impractical. First, emergencies, as a general rule, must be dealt with at once, by a handful of people, and with little debate. For example, the Tylenol deaths [resulting from pills contaminated with poison] forced a quick, responsible answer from James Burke, chairman of Johnson & Johnson. If the issues had been discussed too long, any well-intentioned action (such as a total product recall or the initiation of a tamper-proof packaging system) may have come too late. Although true emergencies are a good excuse for failing to consult with others, they are just that-an excuse. Any excuse, when overused, becomes feeble. Even in emergencies, there is almost always time to solicit input from a few others.

Second, the need for secrecy may limit the size of a decision-making group. For example, in testing product ideas that cannot be patented, small groups must operate

in isolation from the rest of the company.

Emergencies and espionage are two good reasons for confining certain decisions to small, isolated groups.

But these are the exceptions, not the norm. Normal, daily business activity is not filled with emergencies and espionage. If it is, something has gone very wrong with the climate. Suppose, however, that good reasons exist for making a cliquish decision.

Questions 4a-4c are intended to partly mimic the broadened perspective that other viewpoints could have provided.

Question #4a: "Is my decision partial?" Partiality concerns the unfair distribution of advantages and disadvantages. Does the decision seem to benefit one person or one group without benefiting others? Does the decision make one person or group bear the brunt of a setback while the rest of the company remains untouched? Worst of all, does the decision take away from one group and at the same time benefit another? If the answer is "yes," the decision is partial and could be bettered by one that distributes the benefits or hardships more equitably.

To meet consumer needs is a must, but good companies comprise employees, customers, suppliers, contractors, and all community members touched by the company's presence. If a proper balance cannot be struck among the needs of all parties, the company has failed in an important respect. Thus, the marketing cliche "we wouldn't be here without the customer" is neither more nor less true than all the other variants: "We wouldn't be here without the investors, the suppliers, the laborers, the management, the research team, the marketing department," and so forth.

In their effort to acknowledge the value of workers, many companies are committed to job security. In the United States, for example, Johnson Wax, Hallmark Cards, Hewlett-Packard, DEC, and IBM all have nolayoff policies. There are other ways of showing fairness.

Federal Express has a Guaranteed Fair Treatment program that encourages employees who have had problems with supervisors to talk with managers higher in the organization. Levering observes that "good workplaces typically have a variety of practices that reduce class distinctions." He points out that hardly any of the best 100 U.S. companies to work for have executive dining rooms that are off-limits to other employees. All employees at Marion Laboratories get stock options. Some companies, like Advanced Micro Devices, have taken the egalitarian spirit into the streets by eliminating executive parking lots.

Question #4b: "Does it divide the constituencies of the

company?" This question is closely tied to the previous one, because partial decisions, by treating different groups differently, often split companies into warring factions. Of course, every company has some conflict between goals, but managers need not act in ways that heighten the clash.

Obviously, at even the simplest levels of human interaction, goals will conflict. When they do, resolution comes from thinking beyond the immediate goal. Most of society's conventions arose as ways of uniting goals that seem to conflict. For example, when two people cannot drink from the same fountain, drive through the same intersection, or handle the same client at the same time, the conventions of courtesy, right-of-way, and contract negotiation come into play. The simple goals must change from my drinking water to our drinking water, from my quickly getting through the intersection to our safely getting through, and from my handling this client to this client getting properly handled.

A good company benefits every party. Thus, at some level, the goals of all parties must converge. The secret of ethical management is finding the nearest point at which that happens. Ideally, customers want free products, suppliers want infinite demand, managers want free labor and supplies, workers want indefinite time off with pay.

None of these wants will ever be fully met, but some decisions will move all parties further from their ideals, while others will have an uneven mix, and still others will move all parties closer to their ideals.

Traditionally, labor and management have goals that mix about as well as oil and water. These two groups spoke to each other only in the language of power.

Recently, however, various techniques of wedding labor's interests to those of management have been tried.

Question #4c: "Will I have to pull rank (use coercion) to enact it?" If the answer is "yes," perhaps another decision can be found that will sell itself. If a decision is not popular with everyone, only a threat will make it work.

But threats are always unwise, because they teach the wrong lessons and cause more problems than they solve.

People don't like being monitored for productivity any more than they like being treated as if they are thieves; they often take a productivity score to be both an insult and a dare. Foley's of Houston keeps tabs on certain office people by counting the number of customer calls they take. Because "taking a call" is measured by counting the number of times an employee disconnects, customers may call several times before their complaints are processed. Occidental Petroleum measures the productivity of its programmers by counting keystrokes at a computer terminal. This rewards sloppy programming.

Cashier productivity, at scanner-equipped grocery stores, may be measured in "dollars per minute" while the cashier is actively signed onto the register. Under this system, cashiers can improve their productivity figures,

without increasing dollars checked, simply by ignoring the smaller orders and checking only larger ones. Managers who harp on these dollars-per-minute figures are, in effect, lowering real productivity.

To monitor employees and tell them how they are being evaluated is to redirect their energy into trying to outsmart the system. If one lazy employee learns how, all the others are soon made to look bad. One by one, they all give up trying to be really productive and start working on higher productivity scores.

Question #5: "Would I prefer avoiding the consequences of this decision?" This question is intended to make sure that an imminent promotion, transfer, or retirement is not coloring the decision. If a manager is counting on being absent for the repercussions of a decision, he or she might need to look more carefully at those repercussions. In the zeal to make the current quarterly report the best possible, the future may be forgotten. Aided by fast promotions and frequent transfers, many managers may outrun the real consequences of their decisions for a long time. Question #5 simply draws attention to this possible source of nearsightedness.

Companies, like people, are born and die within a span of time. Companies and people have histories, some that are sources of pride, some of shame. Companies and people have futures they can either worry about or look forward to.

A rational person takes steps to prolong and enrich his or her life. This normally means outliving the reckless, careless person by many happy years. So too with companies. A history of bare, quarter-to-quarter survival, where any setback would have proven catastrophic, is not reassuring to employees, managers, or investors.

Question #6: "Did I avoid any of the questions by telling myself that I could get away with it?" In a sense, this is the most important question of all. It is an honesty check, ensuring that the real issues have been looked at.

The very things managers think they can get away with are probably the same things their staffs are already getting away with. If not, by adopting such decisions, managers teach their staffs how.

For example, if the answer to Question #1 was, "I can get away with it, the customers will never know," the question was brushed off. The very idea of "getting away" with something means the decision is questionablewhether from a practical, a cultural, an economic, a technological, or a moral standpoint. Businesses that thrive on "getting away" with things do not get away with much for long.

D About the Authors: Michael R. Hyman,formerly of the University of Houston-Clear Lake, is an associate professor of marketing at the University of North Texas, Denton. Robert Skipper is editor for Shepherd Systems, Inc. Richard Tansey is an assistant professor of marketing at the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay.

THE SHORT STORY

Reaches New Heights inAmerica The American short story always has lived in the shadow of its generic cousin, the novel. Never mind that two Americans-Edgar Allan Poe and Nathaniel Hawthorne-practically invented the modern short story in the mid-19th century or that succeeding generations of writers have continued to turn out short story masterpieces in glorious abundance. Seldom have readers, publishers, and critics paid much attention to this most indigenous of literary forms.

The short story is, after all, short, and Americans tend to prize in literature, as in other things, expansiveness. The short story often has been looked upon as the literary equivalent of finger exercisesthe serious author's way of unlimbering for more strenuous tasks.

Ironically, two of the 20th century's best writers lent credence, through their professional attitudes, to the notion that short stories are somehow minor undertakings.

When Ernest Hemingway, dreaming of immortality, boasted in letters to his publisher of "trying to knock Mr. Shakespeare on his (butt)," the competitive arena he had in mind was not the short story, the form in which he truly excelled, but the modern novel.

"You and I are novelists," he wrote ,to his friend, F. Scott Fitzgerald. "Everything else comes after that." Fitzgerald, though never as good as Hemingway at priming himself for the great literary feat, shared similar priorities. As a way of financing his own bouts of novel writing, he churned out stories for The Saturday Evening Post magazine, bitterly resenting that such work, though necessary, took time away from bigger projects. He would salvage what he could of these stories by routinely stripping them of their high spots for later use in his novels.

If other writers have followed the lead of Hemingway and Fitzgerald in valuing

the novel over the short story, their preference is easy to understand. The successful novel has a chance to become the focus of critical and popular acclaim. It can make both a reputation and a living for its author, which helps explain why even writers with a distinctive gift for brevitySherwood Anderson and Eudora Welty, for example-sometimes have been tempted to stretch their talents over the longer form.

Books of short stories traditionally, have made little or no money. Too often in the past, they haven't even been reviewed. Is it any wonder that Peter Taylor-now in his seventies and called by The Washington Post book critic Jonathan Yardley "the best writer in the United States"-has toiled in relative obscurity all these years? He writes short stories.

Now, however, comes the American short story renaissance-or so it has been called. As more than one interested party has pointed out, renaissance is not the right word for it.

"When people talk about a short story renaissance or revival," explains Shannon Ravenel, senior editor for Algonquin Books and supervising editor of Best American Short Stories, "they are harking back to the 1920s and 1930s when a certain kind of slick, commercial story could command mass-market circulation and prices.

These stories appeared in magazines like Vanity Fair and The Saturday Evening Post, and were that day's equivalent of our TV programs. What we're seeing in short fiction now is not a revival of that."

Ravenel says that most of the 2,000 stories she reads each year in screening entries for her anthology are better crafted and make more serious demands on the reader than those earlier "slicks."

This makes the popularity of today's short fiction all the more remarkable.

The signs of an upsurge in the short story market in America are unmistakable. Bookstores are devoting more shelves to story collections, and journals of national influence in the book trade, such as The New York Times Book Review (NYTBR) and Publishers Weekly, are devoting more space to reviewing them.

Nor is this increased visibility limited to short fiction by established writers (read novelists). Conventional wisdom once held that authors who wanted their stories collected in book form first had to publish at least one, and preferably two, novels. Now, hardly a month passes without the appearance of yet another first collection of stories, often by young authors without a single novel to their credit. Some of these debuts are heralded on the front page of the NYTBR, and one first collection, Emperor of the Air, by 28year-old Ethan Canin, even flirted with making the best-seller list. .Short story anthologies, meanwhile, are flourishing. The annual O. Henry collection of "best American stories" has doubled its sales in the past five years.

Ravenel's Best American Short Stories went from 7,000 copies sold in 1977 to 50,000 in 1988. Also showing rapid growth since its inception in 1976 is The Pushcart Prize collection, which annually culls the best work appearing in small and literary magazines.

The success of these anthologies naturally has given rise to new short story collections, among them The Breadloaf Anthology and The New Generation: Fiction of Our Time from America's Writing Programs. Each new year yields

enough first-rate stories to stock volumes.

Even more indicative of the short story's current prominence is the increased professional recognition given to those who write them. There are new and lucrative prizes for achievement in short fiction. More telling still, an unprecedented number of writers have built considerable reputations in the past decade based primarily on their accomplishments in short fiction: Ann Beattie, T. Coraghessan Boyle, the late Raymond Carver, Richard Ford, Bobbie Ann Mason, Jayne Anne Phillips, James Robison, Mary Robison, and Tobias Wolff (a short story by him begins on page 19).

What's behind the surge in short fiction? Nobody knows for sure, though some say it's not necessarily that more good stories are being written. "There are more stories, but I'm not sure there are any more good ones than before," says Wolff, winner of the 1989 $25,000 Rea Award for the Short Story. "Good stories have always been there; the public excitement about stories, that's what's new."

Jay Neugeboren, who has won more PEN Syndicated Fiction Prizes, (seven) than anyone, agrees. "Are the new short story writers we hear so much about doing anything that, say, Stanley Elkin wasn't doing 20 years ago? Either in terms of exuberance or experimentation with language? I don't think so. But the market for stories is better now, certainly."

However, the short story vogue does not seem to have greatly affected the editorial decisions of the big publishing houses and mass circulation magazines.

Partly because they are able to work on a smaller profit---or are subsidized out of public funds~small magazines, university presses, and small private presses have been in a better position to supply the demand for short fiction. Publishers Weekly estimates that mainstream publishers bought only 40 volumes of stories in 1986 and 1987 combined. However, The International Directory of Little Magazines and Small Presses now lists about 4,000 entries; and 19 percent of the presses (666) and 43 percent of the magazines (802) publish short fiction.

Small magazines and presses must be publishing a few thousand stories every year.

Where are they all coming from? Most observers think the larger volume has much to do with the explosion of writing Shannon Ravenel programs across the country. The Iowa Writers Workshop began in 1939; today more than 300 colleges and universities have creative writing programs.

While even the teachers and students who are part of them sometimes question their ability to turn out better writers, most believe the programs serve a valuable function in helping to subsidize careers. Not only do they bring young writers "out of the cold" into a supportive environment where they can practice their craft for two or three years, aided by fellowships and undergraduate teaching jobs, but the programs also provide steady employment to the many professional writers hired to staff them.

What, if anything, this means to the increase in publications of short stories is anyone's guess. Still, it makes sense that the writer who is on a university payroll and is content writing short stories may¡ feel less pressure to seek out a potentially lucrative novel contract.

Wolff, a professor of creative writing at Syracuse University, New York, suggests a more obvious way in which the writing programs have boosted the number of short stories in circulation. "The students who come out of graduate fiction writing programs usually have a collection of stories in hand, some of them highly polished and ready for publication.

Fewer have novels, and there's a reason for that. The way most graduate writing classes are taught~students reading and discussing one another's work in a workshop environment~favors the short story, which can be conveniently handled by a group. The novel is more unwieldy."

Ravenel, who has taught fiction workshops, agrees with Wolff, but thinks writing programs have another and perhaps more important influence on the short fiction market. "A lot of the students who

pass through these programs will never become professional writers. But almost all of them become sophisticated readers of short stories, and make up an important part of the growing audience for short fiction."

Novelist John Barth has a less flattering theory about those who read short stories. He wonders if their literary taste isn't owing partly to "an ever dwindling readerly attention span." Writing in the NYTBR, Barth says, "It can scarcely be doubted that many of the hours we bourgeois now spend with our televisions and videocassette recorders, and in our cars and at the movies, we used to spend reading novels and novellas and not-soshort stories ... partly because those glitzy other distractions weren't there and partly because we were more generally conditioned for sustained concentration, in our pleasures as well as in our work."

Indeed, for some readers and writers, even short stories are not always short enough. Witness the current fondness for short-short stories, also known as "sudden" or "microwave" fictions. The winner in the 1989 World's Best ShortShort Story Contest was an entry by Laurie Berry that ran only 252 words.

Ravenel believes that shortened attention span is a myth, at least as it applies to those who buy books. She mentions, however, that her most recent short fiction anthology, New Stories from the South, seems to be particularly popular with travelers who shop at airport gift shops. ''I'm not sure what conclusion to draw from that."

Some observers have attempted to link the short story vogue with minimalism, which emerged during the 1980s as an ascendant literary style. Minimalism has been described, with appropriate conciseness, as "pared-down writing about pared-down lives."

Its 20th-century progenitor is Hemingway; its best-known contemporary master was Raymond Carver. The short story is the form most congenial to its Spartan aesthetic.

Minimalism undoubtedly has heightened the prestige of the short story and helped to infuse it with new vigor. Yet Ravenel, who may read more short fic-

tion each year than anyone else, insists that no school of writing possibly can account for the variety of stories that cross her desk. "There's a tremendous assortment-minimalist, yes, but maximalist, too, and realist and magical realist and ones that defy labels altogether.

About the only kind of writing I don't see much these days is experimenta1."

What's behind the short story boom?

"Who cares?" says Neugeboren.

"The important thing is, it's happening. It's a real encouragement to writers, especia1ly young ones, who have more hope of getting their stories into print." Wolff concurs: "I don't know why the time seems to be right for short stories. I just feel lucky to be around for it."

While reluctant to speculate on why readers and publishers are drawn to the short story, Wolff has no hesitation in stating what appeals to him about the form: "I like ambiguity and mystery, and the short story lends itself to that more tentative experience of life. The novel, by its very size, needs to include wisdom, an overa1l vision.

I prefer the vividness and the immediacy of the story, its ability to appear before the reader, be intensely alive for a brief moment, then return to darkness-and yet leave itself with the reader, lodge itself in his memory."

Mystery, vividness, intensity, brevityever since Poe first offered a coherent theory of short fiction in 1842, these qualities have been mentioned in attempts to describe the special a1lure of a good story. They are the same qualities that helped convince Henry James near the turn of the century that the "brief tale"-not the novel-was best suited to capture "the fleetingness and fragility" oflife in the 20th century. For the time being, many writers as we1l as readers appear to agree with James.

D About the Author: Bill Oliver is an assistant professor of English at the University of Texas in San Antonio.

ho says the short 'story is dead?" demands Khushwant Singh in the introduction to his latest collection of stories. "In India," he continues, "it has only recently had its rebirth, and literary pundits who make horoscopes have forecast a long and prosperous life for it." Singh believes that "in all of India's 14 major languages the standard of short-story writing is uniformly high and their popularity unrivalled." / But does the popularity translate into commercial terms? Writers and publishers agree that the career path of short-story writing isn't paved with gold or even silver. "But then," points out David Davidar, chief editor of Penguin India, "writing per se is a difficult way of making a livelihood."

Seen from the perspective of English-language publishing in India, there has been a perceptible increase in the number of shortstory collections being printed-and soldin the past few years. The familiar penguin adorns the spines of collections of short stories (in English) by Ruskin Bond, Manohar Malgonkar, Bharati Mukherjee, and Shashi Tharoor; and (in translation) by Munshi Premchand, Saadat Hasan Manto, O.V. Vijayan, and Vilas Sarang; plus there are the anthologies: Modern Hindi Short Stories (translated into English) and The Penguin Book of Modern Indian Short Stories.

Says Davidar, "Although, on average, novels tend to do better than short stories, we have certainly not suffered on account of publishing short stories. Their sales have been good." Kapil Malhotra, director of Vision Books in New Delhi, sounds somewhat less enthusiastic about the salability of short-story collections. "We usually only publish collections by writers whose novels we publish---:-RajaRao, R.K. Narayan, and Malgonkar," he says. "The response to short stories has always been poorer as compared to novels by the same author. I am not saying that they don't sell at all-we are talking in relative terms. They just don't seem to have the same attraction as longer fiction."

Anil Arora of Bookworm, a bookshop in New Delhi's Connaught Place, says, "Shortstory collections have always sold well, both Indian and foreign. If there is any change today, it is a positive one--a part of the trend toward more reading of Indian authors writing in English. Penguin India has given a boost to Indian short stories."

Says Davidar, "Short stories have never gone out of fashion in India. For as long

W

as I remember there have been Indian shortstory collections available. What Penguin has done is to make the short story in paperback high profile and more accessible through our distribution network. Besides, we came in at a time [1987]when there was a sort of resurgence of Indianness, people were looking for works by Indian writers."

Nirmal Verma, who began his writing career in the golden age of the Hindi short story [1950s and 1960s],and has contributed greatly to it, is more blunt. "If it has become fashionable to read Indian writers, I think it is a very encouraging fashion. There is now a kind of snobbery attached to knowing about them and, although the ignorance is still appalling, I think it is a good trend. The spate of translations of short stories by regional writers into English has been a boon for the regional writer. We have to accept the fact that English does enjoy a certain status symbol-it is deemed a privilege to have your works translated into English. Besides, foreign publishers can take note of you only' when such translations are available. My collections have been published in America and England only because there was already an Indian translation available."

Singh, emphasizes that success in this field is rarely instant: "Some of our best short stories are written by little-known authors and published in obscure magazines that do not pay anything to their contributors. And it takes a long time before the story in question gets to be talked about in literary circles and translated into other languages" he writes.

O.V. Vijayan, whose short stories are bestsellers both in the original Malayalam and in English translations, feels that today the short story "is neglected by both readers and publishers because the reader will only read what is published and vice versa. There is an undoubted shrinking of interest in the short story as compared with the noveL" Does that apply to the writers too? Aren't most of them concentrating on novels? "Yes, they are," says publisher Malhotra, adding, "a novel has more glamour attached to it. It is like the difference between a documentary and a feature film." Says Vijayan, "I prefer writing a novel; it is a more sumptuous, more satisfying activity for me. I write short stories in between my novels as a kind of relaxation ...." Novelist and short-story

In the writer Anita Desai says, "Hardly anyone is writing short stories today. Everyone wants to write novels." Nirmal Verma, who has published four novels and 70 short stories, too prefers writing novels.

But while India's major writers are writing fewer short stories, the rosy scenario Khushwant Singh presents is no figment of fiction. There is what Vijayan calls "a vibrant market for fiction" in the regional languages. Davidar says, "Virtually every region in India has a rich tradition of short stories that is very much alive today."

While the tradition of short stories dates back to ancient times (the Panchtantra, the Jataka tales), the modern Indian short story was born in the early years of this century.

Those pioneers-Rabindranath Tagore, Munshi Premchand, Sarat Chandra~ontinue to be best-sellers today.

But postindependence India saw what Verma calls "a fresh breeze" blowing on the short story, giving it a new identity and a contemporary relevance. Says Verma, "There was an emphasis on authenticity of experience rather than on idealistic messages and romanticism. The urbanization of the intelligentsia, coupled with the breakup of the joint family system and the feeling of security it engendered, brought a whole generation into direct confrontation with the harsh realities of life. It was this that found expression in the short story. Literary magazines mushroomed as the medium for communicating these stories to the middleclass who could identify with them."

Magazines continue to play the major role in sustaining the vernacular short story in India. If, as Davidar says, "writers like Sunil Gangopadhyay and Vijayan are like demigods in their regions," the credit for bringing their work to the public eye goes to magazines. Considering that the readership of these magazines is wider than that of a book, why should a writer look toward book publishers?

"For permanence," says Verma. "Magazines are an ephemeral phenomenon.

Books have a permanence about them, a dignified status of stability. A book is read for years. It is available in libraries."

So the problem is not the lack of good short stories, but the lack of interest among most book publishers in short stories by writers who are unknown or not known nationally. Penguin, Davidar says, cannot be accused of that bias. "We are now coming out with translations of stories in Urdu, Kannada, Tamil, and Bengali. Pen-

guin will always do short stories because they are one ofIndia's literary art forms." What is needed, he believes, is not more short stories but more good translators. In the next few months Penguin will also be publishing at least half a dozen new writers.

Bookworm's Arora says that collections of short stories are being published by small publishers and institutions like the Sahitya Akademi, but they need to concentrate on improved marketing and production.

Verma believes that publishers don't get into short stories "because they feel that when a reader can buy a magazine for, say, Rs. 5 and read a dozen stories, he will hesitate to pick up a book that costs ten times that amount and gives him the same number of stories."

One publisher who defies all commercial norms with happy impunity is Calcutta's P. Lal. His Writers Workshop, devoted to the cause of Indian creative writing in English (which, he says, is "getting better and better"), has published more than 100 shortstory collections, including a few transcreated from other Indian languages. Says Lal, "I don't publish spectacularly erupting or oncefamous and now-extinct volcanoes-the hallowed, haloed names of Indo-Anglia.

I go for the ones who have fire in them but no outlet, because they are new and, so, unknown ... these writers have post-dated quality-wait ten years for the eruption, say in 2001."

The moment a writer achieves fame, he is, of course, hot property. "It is a vicious circle," admits Verma. "You will get published if you are famous and you will get famous if you are published."

One road to fame is awards, and there too short stories get a raw deal. Says Vijayan, "A lot of young writers complain that short stories are rarely taken into account for prestigious literary awards. Anyway, if we are talking of assuring a comfortable existence for writers, awards are hardly relevant because the award money doesn't mean much in terms of today's inflation," "What is needed," he continues, "is an endowment, a grant from foundations that will allow a writer to concentrate on his writing." Davidar too points out that "in the West writers can survive because of grants and fellowships."

Is "happily ever after," then, a long way away for Indian short-story writers? They can take heart from Vijayan's "you can't put a good writer down" philosophy: "Good writing eventually will get recognized."

0

Garden of the

North

American Martyrs

w

A Short Story

by Tobias Wolff

hen she was young, Mary saw a brilliant and original man lose his job because he had expressed ideas that were offensive to the trustees of the college where they both taught. She shared his views, but did not sign the protest petition. She was, after all, on trial herself-as a teacher, as a woman, as an interpreter of history.

Mary watched herself. Before giving a lecture she wrote it out in full, using the arguments and often the words of other, approved writers, so that she would not by chance say something scandalous. Her own thoughts she kept to herself, and the words for them grew faint as time went on; without quite disappearing they shrank to remote, nervous points, like birds flying away.

When the department turned into a hive of cliques, Mary went about her business and pretended not to know that people hated each other. To avoid seeming bland she let herself become eccentric in harmless ways. She took up bowling, which she learned to love, and founded the Brandon College chapter of a society dedicated to restoring the good name of Richard III. She memorized comedy routines from records and jokes from books; people groaned when she rattled them off, but she did not let that stop her, and after a time the groans became the point of the jokes.

They were a kind of tribute to Mary's willingness to expose herself.

In fact, no one at the college was safer than Mary, for she was making herself 'into something institutional, like a custom, or a mascot-part of the college's Copyright:[:: 1981 by Tobias Wolff. From Tobias Wolff's collection of short stvries entitled In the Garden of the North American Martyrs published by the Ecco Press, 1981.

idea of itself.

Now and then she wondered whether she had been too careful. The things she said and wrote seemed flat to her, pulpy, as though someone else had squeezed the juice out of them. And once, while talking with a senior professor, Mary saw herself reflected in a window: She was leaning toward him and had her head turned so that her ear was right in front of his mov.ing mouth. The sight disgusted her.

Years later, when she had to get a hearing aid, Mary suspected that her deafness was a result of always trying to catch everything everyone said.

In the second half of Mary's fifteenth year at Brandon the provost called a meeting of all faculty and students, to announce that the college was bankrupt and would not open its gates again. He was every bit as much surprised as they; the report from the trustees had reached his desk only that morning. It seemed that Brandon's financial manager had speculated in some kind of futures and lost everything. The provost wanted to deliver the news in person before it reached the papers. He wept openly and so did the students and teachers, with only a few exceptions-some cynical upperclassmen who claimed to despise the education they had received.

Mary could not rid her mind of the word "speculate." It meant to guess, in terms of money to gamble. How could a man gamble a college? Why would he want to do that, and how could it be that no one stopped him? To Mary, it seemed to belong to another time; she thought of a drunken plantation owner gaming away his slaves.

She applied for jobs and got an offer from a new experimental college in Oregon. It was her only offer so she took it.

The college was in one building. Bells rang all the time, lockers lined the hallways, and at every corner stood a buzzing water fountain. The student newspaper came out twice a month on wet mimeograph paper. The library, which was next to the band room, had no librarian and no books to speak of.

The countryside was beautiful, though,

and Mary might have enjoyed it if the rain had not caused her so much trouble.

There was something wrong with her lungs that the doctors couldn't agree on, and couldn't cure; whatever it was, the dampness made it worse. On rainy days condensation formed in Mary's hearing aid and shorted it out. She began to dread talking with people, never knowing when she would have to take out her control box and slap it against her leg.

It rained nearly every day. When it was not raining it was getting ready to rain, or clearing. The ground glinted under the grass, and the light had a yellow undertone that flared up during storms.

There was water in Mary's basement.

Her walls sweated, and she had found toadstools growing behind the refrigerator. She felt as though she were rusting out, like one of those old cars people thereabouts kept in their front yards, on pieces of wood. Mary knew that everyone was dying, but it did seem to her that she was dying faster than most.

She continued to look for another job, without success. Then, in the fall of her third year in Oregon, she got a letter from a woman named Louise who'd once taught at Brandon. Louise had scored a great success with a book on Benedict Arnold, and was now on the faculty of a famous college in upstate New York. She said that one of her colleagues would be retiring at the end of the year, and asked whether Mary would be interested in the position.

The letter surprised Mary. Louise thought of herself as a great historian and of almost everyone else as useless; Mary had not known that she felt differently about her. Moreover, enthusiasm for other people's causes did not come easily to Louise, who had a way of sucking in her breath when familiar names were mentioned, as though she knew things that friendship kept her from disclosing.

Mary expected nothing, but sent a resume and copies of her two books.

Shortly after that Louise called to say that the search committee, of which she was chairwoman, had decided to grant Mary an interview in early November. "Now don't get your hopes too high," said

Louise.

"Oh, no," said Mary, but thought: Why shouldn't I hope? They would not go to the bother and expense of bringing me to the college if they weren't serious. And she was certain that the interview would go well. She would make them like her, or at least give them no cause to dislike her.

She read about the area with a strange sense of familiarity, as if the land and its history were already known to her. And when her plane left Portland and climbed easterly into the clouds, Mary felt as if she were going home. The feeling stayed with her, growing stronger when they landed.

She tried to describe it to Louise as they left the airport at Syracuse and drove toward the college, an hour or so away.

"It's like deja vu," she said.

"Deja vu is a hoax," said Louise. "It's just a chemical imbalance of some kind."

"Maybe so," said Mary, "but I still ha ve this sensation." ¡"Don't get serious on me," said Louise.

"That's not your long suit. Just be your funny, wisecracking old self. Tell me now-honestly-how do I look?"

It was night, too dark to see Louise's face well, but in the airport she had seemed gaunt and pale and intense. She reminded Mary of a description in the book she'd been reading, of how Iroquois warriors gave themselves visions by fasting. She had that kind of look about her.

But she wouldn't want to hear that. "Y QU look wonderful," said Mary.

"There's a reason," said Louise. "I've taken a lover. My concentration has im'proved, my energy level is up, and I've lost ten pounds. I'm also getting some color in my cheeks, though that could be the weather. I recommend the experience highly. But you probably disapprove."

Mary didn't know what to say. She said that she was sure Louise knew best, but that didn't seem to be enough. "Marriage is a great institution," she added, "but who wants to live in an institution?"

Louise groaned. "I know you," she said, "and I know that right now you're thinking 'But what about Ted? What about the children?' The fact is, Mary, they aren't taking it well at all. Ted has become a nag." She handed Mary her

purse. "Be a good girl and light me a cigarette, will you? I know I told you I quit, but this whole thing, has been very hard on me, very hard, and I'm afraid I've started again."

They were in the hills now, heading north on a narrow road. Tall trees arched above them. As they topped a rise Mary saw the forest all around, deep black under the plum-colored sky. There were a few lights and these made the darkness seem even grea ter.

"Ted has succeeded in completely alienating the children from me," Louise was saying. "There is no reasoning with any of them. In fact, they refuse to discuss

the matter at all, which is very ironical because over the years I have tried to instill in them a willingness to see things from the other person's point of view. If they could just meet Jonathan I know they would feel differently.

But they won't hear of it.

Jonathan," she said, "is my lover."

"I see," said Mary, and nodded.

Coming around a curve they caught two deer in the headlights. Their eyes lit up and their hindquarters tensed; Mary could see them shaking as the car went by. "Deer," she said.

"I don't know," said Louise, "I just don't know. I do my best and it never seems to be enough. But that's enough about me-let's talk about you. What did you think of my latest book?"

She squawked and beat her palms on the steering wheel. "God, I love that joke," she said.

"Seriously, though, what about you? It must have been a real shockeroo when good old Brandon folded."

"It was hard.

Things haven't been good but they'll be a lot better if! get this job."

"At least you have work," said Louise. "You should look at it from the bright side."

"I try."

"You seem so gloomy. I hope you're not worrying about the interview, or the class. Worrying won't do you a bit of good. Be happy."

"Class? What class?"

"The class you're supposed to give tomorrow, after the interview. Didn't I tell you? Mea culpa, hon, mea maxima culpa. I've been uncharacteristically forgetful lately."

"But what will I do?"

"Relax," said Louise. "Just pick a subject and wing it."

"Wing it?"

"You know, open your mouth and see what comes out. Extemporize."

"But I always work from a prepared lecture."

Louise sighed. "AII right. I'll tell you what. Last year I wrote an article on the Marshall Plan that I got bored with and never published. You can read that."

Parroting what Louise had written seemed wrong to Mary, at first; then it occurred to her that she had been doing the same kind of thing for many years, and that this was not the time to get scruples. "Thanks," she said. "I appreciate it."

"Here we are," said Louise, and pulled into a circular drive with several cabins grouped around it. In two of the cabins lights were on; smoke drifted straight up from the chimneys. "This is the visitors' center. The college is another two miles thataway."

Louise pointed down the road. "I'd invite you to stay at my house, but I'm spending the night with Jonathan and Ted is not good company these days.

You would hardly recognize him."

She took Mary's bags from the trunk and carried them up the steps of a darkened cabin. "Look," she said, "they've laid a fire for you. AII you have to do is light it." She stood in the middle of the room with her arms crossed and watched as Mary held a match under the kindling.

"There," she said. "You'll be snugaroo in no time. I'd love to stay and chew the fat but I can't. You just get a good night's sleep and I'll see you in the morning."

Mary stood in the doorway and waved as Louise pulled out of the drive, spraying gravel. She filled her lungs, to taste the air: It was tart and clear. She could see the stars in their figurations, and the vague streams of light that ran among the stars.

She still felt uneasy about reading Louise's work as her own. It would be her first complete act of plagiarism. It would change her. It would make her less-how much less, she did not know. But what else could she do? She certainly couldn't "wing it." Words might fail her, and then what? Mary had a dread of silence. When she thought of silence she thought of drowning, as ifit were a kind of water she

could not swim in.

"I want this job," she said, and settled deep into her coat. It was cashmere and Mary had not worn it since moving to Oregon, because people there thought you were pretentious if you had on anything but a Pendleton shirt or, of course, raingear. She rubbed her cheek against the upturned collar and thought of a silver moon shining through bare black branches, a white house with green shutters, red leaves falling in a hard blue sky.

Louise woke her a few hours later. She was sitting on the edge of the bed, pushing at Mary's shoulder and snuffling loudly.

When Mary asked her what was wrong she said, "I want your opinion on something. It's very important. Do you think I'm womanly?"

Mary sat up. "Louise, can this wait?"

"Womanly?"

Louise nodded.

"You are very beautiful," said Mary, "and you know how to present yourself."

Louise stood and paced the room.

"That sonofabitch," she said. She came back and stood over Mary. "Let's suppose someone said I have no sense of humor. Would you agree or disagree?"

"In some things you do. I mean, yes, you have a good sense of humor."

"What do you mean, 'in some things'?

What kind of things?"

"Well, if you heard that someone had been killed in an unusual way, like by an exploding cigar, you would think that was funny."

Louise laughed.

"That's what I mean," said Mary.

Louise went on laughing. "Oh, Lordy," she said. "Now it's my turn to say something about you." She sat down beside Mary.

"Please," said Mary.

"Just one thing," said Louise.

Mary waited.

"You're trembling," said Louise. "I was just going to say-oh, forget it. Listen, do you mind if I sleep on the couch.

I'm all in."

"Go ahead."

"Sure it's okay? You've got a big day

tomorrow." She fell back on the sofa and kicked off her shoes. "I was just going to say, you should use some liner on those eyebrows of yours. They sort of disappear and the effect is disconcerting."

Neither of them slept. Louise chainsmoked cigarettes and Mary watched the coals burn down. When it was light enough that they could see each other Louise got up. "I'll send a student for you," she said. "Good luck."

The college looked the way colleges are supposed to look. Roger, the student assigned to show Mary around, explained that it was an exact copy of a college in England, right down to the gargoyles and stained-glass windows. It looked so much like a college that moviemakers sometimes used it as a set. Andy Hardy Goes to College had been filmed there, and every fall they had an Andy Hardy Goes to College Day, with raccoon coats and goldfish-swallowing contests.

Above the door of the Founder's Building was a Latin motto which, roughly translated, meant "God helps those who help themselves." As Roger recited the names of illustrious graduates Mary was struck by the extent to which they had taken this precept to heart. They had helped themselves to railroads, mines, armies, states; to empires of finance with outposts all over the world.

Roger took Mary to the chapel and showed her a plaque bearing the names of alumni who had been killed in various wars, all the way back to the Civil War. There were not many names. Here too, apparently, the graduates had helped themselves. "Oh yes," said Roger as they were leaying, "I forgot to tell you. The communion rail comes from some church in Europe where Charlemagne used to go."

They went to the gymnasium, and the three hockey rinks, and the library, where Mary inspected the card catalog, as though she would turn down the job if they didn't have the right books. "We have a little more time," said Roger as they went outside. "Would you like to see the power plant?"

Mary wanted to keep busy until the last minute, so she agreed.

Roger led her into the depths of the service building, explaining things about the machine, which was the most advanced in the country. "People think the college is really old-fashioned," he said, "but it isn't. They let girls come here now, and some of the teachers are women. In fact, there's a statute that says they have to interview at least one woman for each opening. There it is."

They were standing on an iron catwalk above the biggest machine Mary had ever beheld. Roger, who was majoring in Earth Sciences, said that it had been built from a design pioneered by a professor in his department. Where before he had been gabby, Roger now became reverent. It was clear that to him, this machine was the soul of the college, that indeed the purpose of the college was to provide outlets for the machine. Together they leaned against the railing and watched it hum.

Mary arrived at the committee room exactly on time for her interview, but it was empty. Her two books were on the table, along with a water pitcher and some glasses. She sat down and picked up one of the books. The binding cracked as she opened it. The pages were smooth, clean, unread. Mary turned to the first chapter, which began "It is generally believed that...." How dull, she thought.

Nearly half an hour later Louise came in with several men. "Sorry we're late," she said. "We don't have much time so we'd better get started." She introduced Mary to the men but with one exception the names and faces did not stay together.

The exception was Dr. Howells, the department chairman, who had a porous blue nose and terrible teeth.

A shiny-faced man to Dr. Howells' right spoke first. "So," he said, "I understand you once taught at Brandon College."

"It was a shame that Brandon had to close," said a young man with a pipe in his mouth. "There is a place for schools like Brandon." As he talked the pipe wagged up and down.

"Now you're in Oregon," said Dr. Howells. "I've never been there. How do you like it?"

"Not very much," said Mary.

"Is that right?" Dr. Howells leaned toward her. "I thought everyone liked Oregon. I hear it's very green."

"That's true," said Mary.

"I suppose it rains a lot," he said.

"Nearly every day."

"I wouldn't like that," he said, shaking his head. "I like it dry. Of course it snows here, and you have your rain now and then, but it's a dry rain. Have you ever been to Utah? There's a state for you. Bryce Canyon. The Mormon Tabernacle Choir."

"Dr. Howells was brought up in Utah," said the young man with the pipe.

"It was a different place altogether in those days," said Dr. Howells. "Mrs. Howells and I have always talked about going back when I retire, but now I'm not so sure."

"We're a little short on time," said Louise.

"And here I've been going on and on," said Dr. Howells. "Before we wind things up, is there anything you want to tell us?"

"Yes. I think you should give me the job." Mary laughed when she said this, but no one laughed back, or even looked at her. They all looked away. Mary understood then that they were not really considering her for the position. She had been brought here to satisfy a rule. She had no hope.

The men gathered their papers and shook hands with Mary and told her how much they were looking forward to her class. "I can't get enough of the Marshall Plan," said Dr. Howells.

"Sorry about that," said Louise when they were alone. "I didn't think it would be so bad. That was a real bitcheroo."

"Tell me something," said Mary. "You already know who you're going to hire, don't you?"

Louise nodded.

"Then why did you bring me here?"

Louise began to explain about the statute and Mary interrupted. "I know all that.

But why me? Why did you pick me?"

Louise walked to the window. She spoke with her back to Mary. "Things haven't been going very well for old Louise," she said. "I've been unhappy

and I thought you might cheer me up.

You used to be so funny, and I was sure you would enjoy the trip-it didn't cost you anything, and it's pretty this time of year with the leaves and everything.

Mary, you don't know the things my parents did to me. And Ted is no barrel of laughs either. Or Jonathan, the sonofabitch.

I deserve some love and friendship but I don't get any."

She turned and looked at her watch.

"It's almost time for your class.

We'd better go."

"I would rather not give it. After all, there's not much point, is there?"

"But you have to give it. That's part of the interview." Louise handed Marya folder. "All you have to do is read this. It Isn't much, considering all the money we've laid out to get you here."

Mary followed Louise down the hall to the lecture room. The professors were sitting in the front row with their legs crossed. They smiled and nodded at Mary. Behind them the room was full of students, some of whom had spilled over into the aisles. One of the professors adjusted the microphone to Mary's height, crouching down as he went to the podium and back as though he would prefer not to be seen.

Louise called the room to order. She introduced Mary and gave the subject of the lecture, not knowing that Mary had decided to wing it after all. Mary came to the podium unsure of what she would say; sure only that she would rather die than read Louise's article. The sun poured through the stained glass onto the people around her, painting their faces. Thick streams of smoke from the young professor's pipe drifted through a circle of red light at Mary's feet, turning crimson and twisting like flames.

"I wonder how many of you know," she began, "that we are in the Long House, the ancient domain of the Five Nations of the Iroquois."

Two professors looked at each other.

"The Iroquois were without pity," said Mary. "They hunted people down with clubs and arrows and spears and nets, and blowguns made from elder stalks. They tortured their captives, sparing no one,

not even the little children. They took scalps and practiced cannibalism and slavery. Because they had no pity they became powerful, so powerful that no other tribe dared to oppose them. They made the other tribes pay tribute, and when they had nothing more to pay, the Iroquois attacked them."

Several of the professors began to whisper. Dr. Howells was saying something to Louise, and Louise was shaking her head.

"In one of their attacks," said Mary, "they captured two Jesuit priests, Jean de Brebeuf and Gabriel Lalemant. They covered Lalemant with pitch and set him on fire in front of Brebeuf. When Brebeuf rebuked them they cut offhis lips and put a burning iron down his throat. They hung a collar of red-hot hatchets around his neck, and poured boiling water over his head. When he continued to preach to them they cut strips of flesh from his body and ate them ¡before his eyes. While he was still alive they scalped him and cut open his breast and drank his blood.

Later, their chief tore out Brebeuf's heart and ate it, but just before he did this Brebeuf spoke to them one last time.

He said-" "That's enough!" yelled Dr. Howells, jumping to his feet.

Louise stopped shaking her head. Her eyes were perfectly round.

Mary had come to the end of her facts.

She did not know what Brebeufhad said.

Silence rose up around her; just when she thought she would go under and be lost in it she heard someone whistling in the hallway outside, trilling the notes like a bird, like many birds.

"Mend your lives," she said. "You have deceived yourselves in the pride of your hearts, and the strength of your arms. Though you soar aloft like the eagle, though your nest is set among the stars, thence I will bring you down, says the Lord. Turn from power to love. Be kind. Do justice. Walk humbly."

Louise was waving her arms. "Mary!" she shouted.

But Mary had more to say, much more; she waved back at Louise, then turned off her hearing aid so that she would not be distracted again.

D

empire that includes forests, marshes, prairies, mountains, deserts, and islands in the United States. "We have been called the best kept secret in conservation," says William Blair, the Conservancy's president emeritus.

The Conservancy has completed 4,068 projects since -it acquired its first preserve in 1954; it still owns approximately 40 percent of those holdings. "Most biologists believe that there are from three million to ten million species of plants, animals, and microorganisms on Earth," observes Blair. "Given that estimate and the diversity of our preserves, the number we protect must certainly be in the tens of thousands."

The Nature Conservancy is unique among environmental groups. "We are not in business to lobby for environmental legislation, nor to be engaged in environmental law suits.

There are a lot of organizations that do that," explains Blair. "We can and do work with any person or group, public or private, to acquire the land sheltering species that need protection. " "The Conservancy is all action and no talk. While others have been out preaching conservation, they have been practicing it," attests U.S. Fish and Wildlife Director Frank Dunkle.

The Conservancy raises its funds from private sources, including $20 million from corporations. Its current assets are believed to be in excess of $450 million. This sizable sum, however, represents only a part of the funds required to complete the protection job in America alone.

Development-industrial, housing, and agricultural-is spurring The Nature Conservancy's activities.

"Ironically, just at the time science is beginning to teach us how to use genetic resources in agriculture, About the Author: Maury Bates is a senior editorial consultant for the DuPont Company, of which Conoco is a subsidiary.

medicine, industry, and other ways, the world's gene pools are shrinking rapidly," warns Blair. "In contrast to the past, when the world may have lost one species every millennium, today we are losing at least one species on the average of every few hours to development, disease, or other causes," he adds. Because of this accelerating loss, coupled with today's rapid pace of development, the Conservancy has little time to lose in trying to save even the small fraction of the natural landscape that needs protection.

"The decisions about the future use of the remaining significant pieces of natural land and water in the United States will be made within the next 20 years," says Blair. "Either a group such as ours will have succeeded in protecting the best examples of different kinds of natural habitats, or these areas will be lost in one way or another."

In case anyone doubts that the extinction of species could have a radical effect on mankind, the Conservancy's scientists can quote a number of significant facts. For example, the world has come to de: pend on about 15 highly domesticated forms of plants for food.

However, there are at least 75,000 edible species, many of which are potentially superior to current Grop plants. Production of major crops cannot be maintained or expanded without infusion of fresh genetic material from wild plants. In fact, American farmers need new varieties of wheat at least every 15 years to adapt to changed conditions caused by pests and diseases.

The Nature Conservancy scientists also point out that almost half of all medical prescriptions contain drugs of organic origin. Many medicines depend on a single plant or animal species for their effectiveness. Various forms of marine life are already serving as the main ingredients of potential anticancer drugs. In industry, compounds from seaweeds

alone are used in hundreds of products-from deodorants and paints to building materials and coolants used in oil drilling. "Although wild species are contributing large numbers of ingredients today, they are just the beginning of genetic wonders to come," Blair notes. "The world's wildlife is an invaluable, irreplaceable resource."

With so little time left for selecting and saving some of the best repositories of nature, the Conservancy's efforts are concentrated on identifying, acquiring, and managing the remaining truly important natural areas. The Conservancy has made much progress on a state-by-state inventory of U.S. wildlife and on plans to find the remaining habitats of rare species.

Since the late 1970s, the inventory has been done principally through "natural heritage" programs established by the Conservancy and later turned over to state governments for continuing operation. These programs, now operating in more than 40 American states, have turned up important new information about wildlife. In Ohio, botanists discovered 12 plant species thought to be extinct. Two populations of a bog turtle previously unknown in South Carolina were discovered. In Indiana, a plant-the Kankakee mallow-which grows in only five places in the world, is being safeguarded as a result of the heritage program.

Although the Conservancy's inventories are extensive, no one at the organization suggests that all areas can or should be preserved in their natural condition.

"Obviously, America needs land for other purposes," says Blair. "We are interested in identifying only the top priority areas for preservation."

Examples of how the Conservancy does this in the framework of com-

A

U action and

no talk, the Conservancy has become the world's largest private proprietor of natural areas.

promise and consensus are legion.

Recently, representatives of the Conservancy and ten other private and public organizations met to resolve a knotty environmental problem in California's Coachella Valley near Palm Springs. Because of its good winter climate, the valley is being quickly developed, but environmental groups concerned about its rare oases, sand dunes, and animal and plant life, threatened to bring development to a halt. Cooperating with other private conservation groups, as well as federal and state bodies that were adamant about preserving the ecosystem, and with developers who wanted to get on with their business, the Conservancy worked out a plan to save 8,000 of the most ecologically important hectares worth $20 million.

As a result, the conservationists received a perpetually protected ecosystem, and the developers were permitted to proceed in the less environmentally important parts of the valley without fear of legal suits or constraints.

The Conservancy's activities include a generous share of hard-nosed real estate dealing. In one recent year the organization bought, sold, and traded about $60 million worth of property, averaging more than one transaction every day. The largest transaction, in terms of land area, was concluded in 1973, when 88,000 hectares of an old Spanish land grant were acquired in New Mexico.

Because the Conservancy is already the world's largest private proprietor of natural areas, it is understandably interested in reducing its costs and workload. "We are always looking for

another trust, university, or public agency to own and manage lands that we have identified as harboring rare species," says Blair. When an insurance company recently wanted to donate more than 40 hectares of wetlands on the North Carolina coast, the Conservancy acted as an intermediary between the company and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, which ultimately took over the land.

Ecologically interesting land is not the only kind of property for which the Conservancy is searching. In 1981 it came up with the concept of trade lands. Under the program, it invites donations of real estate that do not qualify for preservation, sells the donated properties, and then uses the proceeds to buy important habitats.

The Conservancy has acquired and sold an obsolete California winery, a huge city apartment complex, and countless gas stations. Two of the largest gifts under the program were from the Consolidation Coal Company, a subsidiary of Co no co, Inc., in Houston, Texas.

"Usually we have the experience and expertise to develop creative solutions that can turn white elephants into something useful," says Ray Culter, vice president of Protection Projects. A few years ago a Conservancy member in Huntington, West Virginia, drove past a 100-yearold abandoned factory building in his city and told Culter's group about it.

Culter contacted the Californiabased plastics corporation that owned the building and learned that the property had been on the market for one-and-a-half years, draining corporate funds with the costs of its management, taxes, maintenance, and security. Culter convinced the plastic manufacturer's management that the firm would be better off donating the property to the Conservancy and taking a tax deduction.

The Conservancy then enlisted the help of Huntington's Industrial Development Commission.

The commission agreed to take over the property, while the Conservancy looked for a buyer. After some vigorous marketing, the Conservancy found a buyer-a large supermarket chain looking for a regional warehouse and distribution center.

"Everyone benefited," says Culter.

"The former owner got rid of a drain on earnings, the city has a new taxpayer and employer, and we are able to use the proceeds to acquire more natural land."

If, as forecasts indicate, most of the critical natural habitats in the United States should be gone by the turn of the century, the Conservancy's real estate activities will gradually diminish. "We will be a different kind of organization ten or 20 years from now," comments Culter. "Instead of bringing land and water under protection, our job will be one of stewardship. " The science of maintaining habitats is still in its infancy. "No one has all. the answers," admits Blair. "What we now make are intelligent guesses about what is best for wildlife. It's a new science that has evolved only in our lifetime." The Nature Conservancy is using about 25 of its large preserves as research centers where its staff or scientists from nearby universities can refine their guesses into more solid ecological fact.

The organization also has accelerated its programs for sharing identification and protection methods with other countries. "The need to preserve natural diversity does not stop at the U.S. border," says Blair.

"Thousands of plants and animals are unique to one part of the Earth or another. We will certainly not be able to carry the load for the whole world, but there are many ways that we can make significant contributions by sharing our techniques."

Surprisingly, most of the land protected by the Conservancy is not off

limits to the American public. Even hunting and fishing are permitted on some of the large preserves.

Conservation and use, Blair points out, are not opposing objectives when the use is planned so that it does not disrupt the ecology.

"But," Blair continues, "acquiring land for recreation, for its scenic beauty, or for outdoor education is not our prime purpose. Our job is much more basic and crucial. In preserving as many of the world's species as we can, we are assuring that we will be able to provide food, medicine, and an expanding number of genetically based new industries and products for ourselves, for our children, and for posterity."

0 Right: Giant palm trees thrive in Coachella Valley, California, where the Conservancy's 5,200-hectare preserve coexists with nearby real estate development. Below: Big Bend, comprising some 100 kilometers of Florida's Gulf Coast, was purchased by The Nature Conservancy for $20 million. lts vast stream-laced marshes and sea grass beds shelter many endangered wildlife species.

Grouping

for Success

A technician examines a teflon-lined valve in the Tuflin division of the Sanmar Engineering Corporation that has successfully collaborated with a number of American companies to manufacture precision equipment in India.

Without much fanfare, a relatively small group of engineering companies based in Tamil Nadu has achieved an enviable reputation for its range of hightech products. Building on its strengths, and planning each diversification with astuteness, the Sanmar Engineering Corporation (SEC) has written an industrial success story based on Indo-U.S. collaborations.

The group made its debut in 1976 with creation of the flagship company, Durametallic India Ltd. (DMI), to make precision mechanical seals (see SPAN July 1977).Now, 15years later, SEC has not only lived up to the early promise repre-

sented by Durametallic, but has also joined other leading U.S. manufacturers to set up a cluster of compact companies that complement one another's products. The SEC group now comprises five companies involving seven product divisions, which make critical components for the fertilizer and petrochemical industries and for nuclear power plants.

And the group is still growing.

N. Sankar, a young entrepreneur from a Madras family of industrialists, launched DMI in collaboration with the Durametallic Corporation of Kalamazoo, Michigan. The

American company contributed 40 percent of the equity and all the know-how. Both sides agree that the collaboration has been an unalloyed success. Annual sales figures have almost touched the Rs. 100 million mark, representing a significant market share.

Durametallic U.S.A.'s experience with its Indian associate encouraged other leading American specialty product companies to go into joint ventures with SEC: • BS&B Safety Systems Inc., of Tulsa, Oklahoma, joined hands with the SEC group to make rupture disks and other safety equipment in India. Production commenced in 1981.

BS&B India already has annual sales of Rs. 30 million, which represents as much as 85 percent of the market for its product line. The other 15 percent of the Indian market requirement is imported, since there are no other Indian manufacturers of this precision range of products. Prior to BS&B, India had to import its entire requirement, spending precious foreign exchange.

• The Xomox Corporation of Cincinnati, Ohio, a subsidiary of Emerson Electric Corporation, entered into a partnership with SEC for the manufacture of the Xomox range of Tuflin (teflon-lined) valves in India. The Xomox Indian operation, which began production in 1984, has annual sales of Rs. 100 million. Here too, the American company has an equity stake and transfers know-how on a continuous basis to the Indian company.

• Moorco International Inc., U.S.A., through its associate companies Smith Meter Inc., of Erie, Pennsylvania, and Crosby Valve and Gage Company of Wrentham, Massachusetts, joined SEC to set up two divisions of Moor co (India) Ltd., both of which began production in 1984. Smith India Division makes flow and gas meters, and Crosby India Division makes safety relief valves.

• The Automatic Switch Company (ASCO) of New Jersey's joint venture agreement with SEC led to the establishment of ASCO India Ltd., which began manufacturing solenoid valves and switches in 1989.

• The latest company to join the SEC fold is GuIde (India) Ltd., under the terms of a joint venture agreement with a German associate company of Xomox U.S.A. GuIde (India) began production of specialized control valves last year.

Apart from these companies in Tamil Nadu, another SEC venture is based in Singapore. Durametallic Asia Pte. Ltd., which commenced production in 1982, is doing very well under SEC's management. It is funded by the parent U.S. company, with technology transferred from Madras.

So many partners, so many companies, so many products.

How do they all work together? "It's actually beautifully logical," says Sankar. "Every time we have diversified, we have followed some basic rules, and they have always paid off."

Sankar says that SEC diversifies only into related product lines, for which it has already identified a market. It always seeks out world leaders in the respective fields to go into

partnership with, offers its partner a stake in the eq uity of the Indian company, and follows up with handsome returns on investment. Above all, it is always quick to absorb and, where necessary, to adapt the technology acquired from its partners, offering the Indian buyer critical products of international quality at reasonable prices.

Sankar's family controls giant companies such as Chemicals and Plastics (Chemplast) India Ltd. (of which Sankar is managing director). A subsidiary of Chemplast is Metkem Silicon Ltd., which scored a first in India by producing high quality polysilicon based on indigenous technology. Sankar's brother, Kumar, has also promoted a number of high-tech electronics industries that are doing very well.

"We decided early on that the technology chosen should be contemporary in terms of world standards, and that we should plan for long-term growth with each of our collaborators," Sankar says. "In each case, our search ended in the United States. Some of our collaborators are keen competitors among themselves in the U.S. market. But as far as we are concerned, our choice of partners has contributed to product and market synergy.

Each one of the collaborations is working beautifully."

And what is the view from the other side? Alan G. Dunstan, vice president (operations) of Smith Meter, U.S.A., says his company has benefited significantly from gaining access to the large and growing market in India for flow and gas meters. "We are fortunate in our collaborators," he says, "because Sanmar already had such valuable contacts with the pharmaceutical, petrochemical, and fertilizer industries, which are the main customers.

Together we have extended the market considerably." Dunstan also points out that their Indian joint venture has been more successful and effective than a similar

One of Sanmar's many American partners is the Crosby Valve and Gage Company.

The Crosby division in India makes safety relief valves.

one in Brazil. "We find working in India more compatible.

Also, our Indian collaborators, Sanmar, have been able to absorb the technology very quickly and produce quality meters to international standards." A new line of meters, for measuring mass rather than volume, is to be launched by the Smith India Division soon. Says Dunstan, "The mass meters will be especially suitable for the pharmaceutical industry."

Hans H. Kluge, president of the Automatic Switch Company, also a subsidiary of the Emerson Electric Corporation, was recently in Madras to visit ASCO India. The American

company has nine subsidiaries scattered all over the world. "I wish some of the others were as good as this one in Madras," says Kluge. "Such a combination of commitment and skills is not easy to find. The product quality is excellent, and the level of indigenization is good." Kluge's visit was mainly to work out, with his Indian partners, details of an expansion program for ASCO India. "We plan to expand not only the volume but also the range of our solenoid valves and switches," he said.

DMI has come a long way in its 15 years. Today, it boasts a 40 percent share in the competitive mechanical seals market.

"We have an established brand name and image, and the capacity to service customers promptly and efficiently anywhere in India," says S. R. Seshadri, executive director of SEe. As seniormost officer of SEC, Seshadri's hand has been firmly on the controls from the very beginning of the group's joint ventures. "Every growth plan, every diversification effort, was meticulously orchestrated by the management," he says. "The result is a well-balanced portfolio of complementary industrial products for critical, fail-safe functions in major industries."

DMI turns out a staggering 14,000 different types of seals.

Seshadri remarks, "In this line of business, nonstandard is standard. We have to make seals to customers' specific requirements, and this is where our technological strength is a great asset." He says DMI has added to its product range over the years by adaptation.

The latest addition to the DMI product range is the metal bellows seal, a compressible seal for high-temperature applications. It is made of a number of imported alloy stampings welded together with microscopic precision using sophisticated machines. The workers on these machines were given intensive training in this technology by the parent company in the United

A Surgeon's Story

The Lambs and Their Shepherds

Renee Hartz, one of America's top heart surgeons"used to be a waitress. Today she is a role model for many medical students. Hartz, the daughter of a miner, paid her way through medical school by a combination of working in a lab, student loans, a sinall scholarship, and her savings as a waitress.

Lambs Farm in Chicago, Illinois, has demonstrated, that mentally retarded young adults can shoulder responsibility with compassion and dedication. The Farm, which began as a pet shop, is now a community center with residential, educational, work, and recreational facilities for its 150 mentally retarded residents.

Ascendant Saturn The Saturn, a new compact car from General Motors (GM), heralds a U.S. manufacturing revolution:.lt is ~joint management-union venture, GM managers and 3,000 members oj) the United Auto Workers fully share decision making on every issue-from performance to profitability.

By manufacturing quality specialty products, Sanmar has not only absorbed critical technological expertise but also saved the country precious foreign exchange.

States, since the product is new to India.

SEC has built its diversification strategy on existing strengths to meet market demands. New collaboration ventures currently are being planned in the areas of instrumentation and process control to bring SEC even closer to Sankar's professed aim-to offer "not just products but total solutions."

Indeed, SEC has already made a creditable beginning in this direction. Working with an associate group, Sanmar Electronics Corporation, Moorco (India) Ltd. successfully completed a Rs. 120 million project at the giant petrochemical complex in Hazira, Gujarat. The project involved the design, engineering, supply, and commissioning of the complete wagon and truck loading systems for the despatch of liq uefied petroleum gas. The SEC consortium came up with an entirely new concept-a system of static weighing for truck loading, inmotion weighing for wagon loading, and accurate filling through SEe's Smith flow meters, all of which are monitored and supplied by SEe. Says Dunstan, "If the sophisticated metering technology had not been available within India, there would have been no option but to import the entire system, including the design, from abroad, at the cost of substantial foreign exchange." The successful completion of the Hazira project has done much to boost the morale of SEe's young team of professionals.

"The morale of our employees has always been high," says

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Seshadri. "They have ample opportunities to learn and grow in their careers, because we are a dynamic group. At the same time, we do blood fresh young talent periodically. Also, every time there is a new venture on the anvil, or a new product line is introduced, we send a handpicked team to our collaborators in the United States so that they may become familiar with the technology at first hand."

SEe's list of customers reads like a Who's Who of prestigious process industries. It includes Indian Oil, Indian Petrochemicals, Bharat Petroleum, National Organic Chemicals, Engineers India, Madras Refineries, Southern Petrochemical Industries, Hindustan Lever, and Madras Fertilizers, besides fossil fuel and nuclear power plants, and leading pump manufacturers.

With an annual turnover of about Rs. 340 million, up from Rs. 280 million the previous year, and with market shares ranging from 40 to 90 percent for its various products, the Sanmar Engineering Corporation is playing precisely the role it assigned to itselfin a script of its own making-to be the market leader in "niche markets" for specialty products; to seek out the best available technology worldwide and enter into partnerships to mutual advantage; to save foreign exchange for India on a continuous basis by import substitution of critical components for process industries; to build up technological expertise within the country; to be alert to every logical growth and diversification opportunity. And, in doing so, to prove that the cluster and consortium approach to building an industrial group can make for commercial success.

D About the Author: Malini Seshadri, afrequent Madras-based free-lance writer.

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"She loves me. She wants a career. She loves me. She wants a career.... "

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ERNEST HEMIN&VlAY IS RIDICULING- OSCAR WILDE.' S 'WINE 5PRITZER WHIl..E TRVf1AN CAPOTE TAKES NOTES.

t)\ Terrible

FOCUS The news of the assassination of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi caused deep shock and anguish in the United States. "On a p~rsonal basis, I mourn the loss," President George Bush said. "But when you look at his contribution to international order, and when you think.of decency, it's a tragedy that people resort, in a democratic country-or elsewhere-to violence of this nature. It's just appalling. I don't know what the world's coming to. It's a sad thing for this young man to have lost his life in this way."

President Bush, accompanied by son Marvin P. Bush, National Security Adviser Brent Scowcroft, and White House Chief of Staff John Sununu, went to the Indian Embassy in Washington, D.C., to sign a book of condolences.

Speaking to Indian Ambassador Abid Hussain, the President described Gandhi as "a real good friend." "In our business, we make many friends," he said. "But this one was for real." He called Gandhi's death "a terrible tragedy. [It] tests the souls of Indians and tries the hearts of all of us. I fear not for Indian democracy ....lndia's democracy is strong, steadfast, and has the support of our country. It always has and it always will."

The U.S. Senate passed a resolution praising Rajiv Gandhi for his "commitment to economic liberalization and individual rights" and for his "important contribution to better relations between the world's most populous democracy and the United States." The House of Representatives also passed a resolution. It described Gandhi as "a friend of the United States as well as a strong proponent and an effective spokesman on behalf of Indian democracy."

U.S. Vice President J. Danforth Quayle, who along with his wife Marilyn attended Rajiv Gandhi's funeral, made the following statement on arrival in New Delhi on May 24: I am here on behalf of President George Bush and the American people to express our grief at the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi. I first met Rajiv Gandhi in 1985 at a private luncheon after he had spoken to the joint session of Congress. I was impressed at that time with his commitment to democracy.

He was determined to bring economic and social development to India. He represented a new generation of leadership in the world. This assassination is simply an outrage. The enemies of democracy have struck once again, but they cannot prevail. Let us take this tragic incident as an opportunity to recommit ourselves to the ideals of democracy, peace, prosperity, and love-the ideals of Rajiv Gandhi.

On behalf of the American people, I express our sympathies and prayers to the Gandhi family who have suffered so much and to the people of India. In this time of tragedy the United States stands with India.

Thankyouve~much.

We are shocked and saddened to learn of the senseless assassination of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi. A strong voice for India, respected as a statesman and a warm human being in the United States, his insight, leadership, and friendship will be sorely missed. All of us at the American Embassy wish to extend to Mrs. Gandhi and the children and to the people of India our sincere condolences at this time of sorrow and loss.

Vice President Dan Quayle, who visited New Delhi to attend Rajiv Gandhi's funeral, calls on Mrs. Sonia Gandhi to offer condolences. In the center is former Minister of State for External Affairs Natwar Singh.

Many

other

American

ers, as well as newspapers magazines praised

and

in the United States,

the memory

mer Indian

lead-

of the for-

Prime Minister.

Here

is what some of them said: As we express our condolences to the Gandhi family and to the people of India, we must also work to ensure that the cause for which Rajiv Gandhi gave his life-the cause of a democratic and united Indiashall continue.

-Claiborne Pen, Chairman, Senate Foreign Relations Committee

[Rajiv Gandhi] fell at the hands of persons of fierce and demented sectarian belief. The world has lost a great democratic leader. You can blow up a leader; you cannot blow up a democracy.

-Daniel P. Moynihan, Senator (former U.S. Ambassador to India)

We will remember Rajiv Gandhi for his significant contribution to India's economic development and growing leadership in the international arena ....

Here in America, we will also remember a leader who worked to expand mutual understanding and respect, building a stronger foundation for the¡ friendship between our two countries.

-George Mitchell, Senate Majority Leader

The assassination of Rajiv Gandhi was a personal tragedy for his family and friends and a national trauma for most Indians. It also will be felt by democrats around the world as a violation of their secular faith: The belief that sovereign citizens have an inalienable right to choose their political leaders, peacefully.

Tragedy" President George Bush signs the condolence book at the Indian Embassy in Washington, D.C. He wrote: "With respect for a great leader, with love from Barbara and me, for a great friend, and my respects for the Indian people." He underlined the words "great leader."

One can only be appalled at the savagery and utter contempt for democracy that prompted the assassination of Rajiv Gandhi this week. People around the world are saddened by the death of the former-and he hoped, future-prime minister of India as he campaigned in this week's elections ...

The world mourns with India in this tragic hour, and the good will of the world supports India in its helter-skelter but magnificent embrace of democracy.

- The Christian Science Monitor Rajiv Gandhi. ..was a man of the modern world, an airline pilot forced by the violence that eventually consumed him to take up a life of politics to which he was born but in which he was not schooled ....

Gandhi won the admiration of Ronald Reagan during a visit here in 1985, and White House

aides said at the time that the President had developed a father-son relationship with the young Prime Minister.

These personal ties helped clear decades of misunderstanding between Washington and New Delhi.

- The Washington Post, RICHARD M. WEINRAUB and STUART AUERBACH

...we hope this tragedy does not obscure Rajiv Gandhi's accomplishments. They were not only considerable and of great benefit to his countrymen but they were the product of a democracy that remains open, however fitfully, to events elsewhere in the world.

- The Wall Street Journal With the gruesome murder of Rajiv Gandhi, India now teeters at the edge of an incalculable tragedy ....lt would be sentimental to say that Mr. Gandhi was

his country's best hope of finding its way out of the rising bloodshed that threatens to overwhelm its democratic institutions. But as a former prime minister and the likeliest candidate to be the next one, he was the central figure in Indian politics.

More than that, he was the third-and apparently the last-of the great family that has led Indian governments almost continuously since independence 44 years ago.

- The Washington Post Whoever killed Rajiv Gandhi yesterday struck at democracy itself, just as did his mother's assassins seven years ago. But democracy survived then, and there is reason to hope it will respond sturdily now ....

But the measure of a society is not whether rabid or deranged killers lash out against order; it is how resiliently the

society responds. The voters of India have a remarkable chance, in the national election now under way, to punish the assassins by choosing skilled and temperate leaders. The sole consolation in this savage¡ affair is that India today possesses such candidates.

- The New York Times ...when thrust into power after the assassination of his mother, Gandhi led India through a turbulent time of economic progress marred by rising sectarian violence ....

Gandhi grew from a reticent young amateur politician to an increasingly confident if besieged administrator, championing his nation's leadership in the developing world and espousing modernization to prepare India for the 21st century.

- The New York Times, STEVEN R. WEISMAN

As Prime Minister, Rajiv Gandhi developed a close rapport with American leaders during a five-day state visit to the United States in 1985. Far left: President Ronald Reagan and wife Nancy receive Rajiv and Sonia Gandhi at a White House banquet held in their honor. Left: Gandhi addressed a joint session of the U.S. Congress to repeated applause.

Seen here are then Vice President George Bush and Speaker of the House of Representatives Thomas P. (Tip) O'Neill.

Archives of Architecture For more than 50 years, a federal program called the Historic American Buildings Survey (HABS) has been amassing pictorial and written records of America's architecture-from Native American pueblos (terraced adobe structures found in the American Southwest and in Mexico) to early skyscrapers. HABS has documented some 16,000 important structures, more than one-fourth of which no longer stand. Its archives in the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C., contain more than 40,000 measured drawings, 77,000 photographs, and 42,000 pages of written architectural and historical data.

The program began in 1933, partly as a way to provide jobs for architects, draftsmen, and photographers who were unemployed during America's Great Depression and partly as a means of preserving a record of old buildings, many of which were in danger of being torn down to make way for more modern structures or were decaying for lack of attention.

At first, 1,200 professionals were hired for a six-month project.

Their work proved to be so useful and valuable that the program's sponsors-the National Park Service, the American Institute of Architects, and the Library of Congress-agreed to make HABS a permanent institution, funded by federal, state, and private sources.

In recent years, most professional architects have been too busy designing new buildings to spend much time charting old ones; therefore, HABS has come to rely on architecture students, who work on the project during their summer vacations under supervision of professors and practicing architects. During one recent summer, 50 students worked at II sites, including Mission Concepcion near San Antonio, Texas, built by the Spanish in the early 1700s, and the Boott Cotton Mills in Lowell, Massachusetts, which produced textiles from 1835 to 1955.

The value of HABS was made evident recently in a very practical way: "Only the 41 measured drawings and 57 photos in HABS files," said Time magazine, made "possible an accurate reconstruction of Springwood, the Hyde Park [New York] mansion of Franklin D. Roosevelt that suffered severe fire damage in 1982."

0 Left: Cast-iron clustered piers in the rotunda of the state capitol in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. built in 1850; photographed in 1978. Right: John White (on ladder), a professor at Texas Tech University in Lubbock, and William Peoples, a graduate of California Polytechnic State University in San Luis Obispo, measure the facade of the chapel at Mission Concepcion near San Antonio, Texas.

Right: Detail of a castiron column from the gallery of Le Pretre House in New Orleans, Louisiana, built in 1835; drawn in 1940. Below: The Isaac M. Wise Temple in Cincinnati, Ohio, built betll'een 1863 and 1865; drawn in 1957.

Bottom: The Towles House in Lancaster County, Virginia, built in the late l600s; photographed in 1940:

1. Stair hall in the Wickham- Valentine House in Richmond, Virginia, built in 1812; photographed in 1940.

2. The Woodlawn Plantation near Napoleonville, Louisiana, built in the 1850s; photographed in the 1930s. After that the house was demolished.

3. A drawing made in 1934 of the front elevation of Woodlawn Plantation.

4. Shower stall in the Ivinson Mansion in Laramie, Wyoming, built in 1892; photographed in 1974.

5. Covered bridge in Zanesville, Ohio, completed in 1832 and replaced in 1901; photographed in 1900.

6. Night view of the Travel and Transport Group at the 1933 Century of Progress International Exposition in Chicago, Illinois.

by PETER A. QUINN

It was our first real fight. We were on our honeymoon, in the highlands of Scotland, driving to a town that, altho.ugh prominent on our road map, had proved to be as elusive as Brigadoon.

As afternoon turned to dusk and dusk to night, we passed through the same villages and landscapes we had visited hours before. After another round of intermittent argument, my wife gave up demanding that we stop to ask directions.

She retreated into a hostile silence.

"Up there, at the top of the hill, is the crossroad we've been looking for," I said.

"Another ten minutes and we'll be home free. Trust me." Twenty minutes later, at yet another forlorn mountain crossroad, she exploded: "What's wrong with you?

Why can't we stop and ask directions?

Why can't you admit we're lost?"

Later, in a drafty, dank hotel bar (we had forfeited our reservations in the inn overlooking the loch because we were five hours late), we sat and sipped Scotch. We were two adults determined to build a marriage on openness and honesty, and we tried to reason out my phobia of asking directions.

Maybe, I said, it was the result of having grown up in the Bronx [in New York], where ethnic enclaves were as rigidly demarcated as in the Balkans. Opening your mouth to ask directions in the Bronx could mark you as an outlander and earn you an immediate expulsion.

If that were the case, my wife said, why hadn't her Bronx upbringing worked the same way? She had a point.

"What about your family?" she asked.

"Were your parents uptight about asking for directions?" I thought about it. My parents seldom argued, except when my father, who didn't drive, would give directions to my mother, who did.

In fact, I remembered vividly how, on

one occasion, we drove to a wake in Brooklyn with my father navigating. "It's right over the Manhattan Bridge," he told my mother.

Over we went. We rode down streets lined with apartment houses, past quiet blocks of one-family homes, through deserted industrial areas where snarling, oilsmudged dogs ran next to the car, until we arrived at rotting piers poking out into New York harbor. In the distance, we could see Staten Island.

My mother turned the car around.

"This is ridiculous," she said angrily. "I'll find a gas station, and we'll ask directions. " My father pointed straight ahead.

There was steel in his voice: "Just stay on this street until you can make a left."

We drove on. It was dark, and my two sisters were asleep in the back seat before my mother finally pulled over and, her voice quavering with indignation, said: "Why can't we ask directions? What's the' shame in being lost?"

The car windows rattled with my father's roar. It shook my sisters awake.

"We don't need to ask directions," he shouted, "because we're not lost."

Back in New York, after the honeymoon in Scotland, I tried to come to grips with what seemed to be the long-term effects of an incident from my childhood.

I began by asking directions to places I already knew how to reach. To lessen my embarrassment, I used an English accent or Irish brogue; still I never felt at ease.

Only gradually, as I shared my fear with friends, did I grasp that this feeling wasn't unique to me, that it wasn't a consequence of personal experience or my childhood conditioning. This was a crosscultural, cross-generational feeling shared by practically every man I talked to, Gentile or Jew, black or white, young or old.

No matter where they were raised, men

admitted that they hated to ask directions. They almost all told the same story of marital spats and lovers' quarrels sparked by their insistence that"they knew where they were going. It's up the road to the left. Trust me.

I realized that, in a world in which all the differences between the sexes are being banished or diminished, in which boys were no longer ashamed to cry or girls to swear, in which men shared in housework and women tried out for the National Basketball Association, a man's stubbornness about his sense of direction stands as an irreducible part of his identity, as a last unadulterated distinction of maleness.

It is in our DNA. It was written there during the passage of millenniums, during a million years of unrecorded history.

It was written there by Java man and Peking man and Neanderthal man, by the hunter, the stalker, the nomad on the long journey across icy wastes and empty grasslands, by the ancestral fathers who sniffed the wind, set markers on trees and in the earth, watched the stars and the planets, put an ear to the ground, forever aware that a wrong turn or a mistaken step could lead them and their entire tribe into the middle of a swamp or the maw of a saber-tooth.

My wife and I have now been married four years. We both work. We share the chores of shopping, cooking, cleaning, and paying the bills. I attend childbirth classes with her in preparation for our first baby.

But when we travel, it's understood that we never ask directions. I sniff the wind, study the horizon, stare at the map, silently.

We're not lost.

Trust me.

0 About the Author: Peter A. Quinn is a speechwriter for Time Inc.

Machine Age Art The machine and its influence on art and design was the subject of a recent exhibition, "The Machine Age in America, 1918-1941."

few exhibitions linger on in memory years after they were mounted. One such exhibition is "The Machine Age in America, 1918-1941," which recently completed a tour of major museums in the United States. Organized in 1986 by the Brooklyn Museum in New York, it was described

by John Russell of The New York Times as "an aesthetic experience of a high order, in which artists, inventors, and designers-many of them already forgotten--eombined to heighten and tweak our responses to a period not often studied in such depth."

"The Machine Age in America," which was conceived by Dianne H. Pilgrim, Brooklyn Museum's curator of decorative arts, and Richard Guy Wilson, a professor of architectural history at the University of Virginia, brought alive a periodbetween the end of World War I and entry of the United States in World War II-when machines reshaped and redefined American culture, casting modernity in their own image.

The exhibit displayed a plethora of objects that evoked nostalgic memories-a bright blue and yellow monoplane, a 1935 Chrysler sedan gleaming in perfect platinum finish.

Among the everyday objects were period telephones, radio sets,

A

pencil sharpners, cocktail glasses, fabrics, jewelry, and the ancestors of today's vacuum cleaners, refrigerators, gas stoves, and television sets. ¡Items too big for the museum-locorepremotives, passenger liners, industrial machinery-were sented by models.

"We look at these everyday things as if we had never seen them before," Russell noted. "It soon gets home to us that these things, at that time, had no precedent....Such artistic creations bear upon transformations that Americans now take for granted."

The displays illustrated as never before the role that industrial designers-Norman Bell Geddes, Walter Dorwin Teague, Erik Magnussen, Harold L. Van Doren, J.G. Rideout, Donald Deskey, and many others-played in defining and popularizing the machine aesthetic.

Another major ingredient of the exhibition, in sections such as The Machine in the Landscape and Emergence of a New Age Art, showed how artists, sculptors, and photographers responded to the machine age.

Photography was the great art form of the period, and its practitioners were far ahead of painters in portraying heavy industry. "This single medium," wrote architectural historian

1. Louis Lozowick, Machine Ornament No.2; ca. 1927; brush and ink on paper; 56 x 38 em.

2. Nathan George HorwiU (designer); "Beta" chair (prototype made for Howell Company, Geneva, Illinois); 1930; chrome-plated tubular steel, upholstered.

3. Donald Deskey (designer); table lamp manufactured by Deskey-Vollmer, New York City; 1927-29; chrome-plated metal and wood; 39 x 22 x 27 em.

Edward Steichen; George Washington Bridge; 1931; gelatin-silver print; 24 x 20 em.

Carol Willis in Architectural Record, "brings into focus many of the major issues of the period-the relation of man, machine, art, and money .... In these pictures machines appear in abstraction and in precisionist detail, as subject and as symbol, as art and as commerce."

The attention that the exhibit gave to artists also helped to explode the myth that only in Europe did the machine age find its definitive expression. Wrote Russell, "The very phrase Art Deco, first floated in Paris in 1925, remains the single most current description for the decorative arts of the period, and the machine-aesthetic in both painting and sculpture is best known for its apotheosis in the work of [French artist] Fernand Leger.

"It was the task of the Brooklyn exhibition to shift that emphasis. No one is going to say that, good as they are, the paintings of Elsie Driggs and George Ault, or even those of Charles Sheeler and Charles Demuth, can rank with Leger's.

Nor do our native decorative arts have either the innate elegance or the superfine craftsmanship of what we see enshrined in the Musee des Arts Decoratifs in Paris. But the American engineers, designers, and inventors of the 1920s were not in competition with Paris. Their ambition was to define

1. Alexander Calder; model for motorized outdoor complex for the World's Fair, New York, 1938; painted metal; 37 x 50 x 25 em.

2. Walter Dorwin Teague

(designer); camera.and box manufactured by Eastman Kodak, Rochester, New York; 1930. Camera: Chrome-plated and enameled metal, leather, and paper. Box: Wood, enameled and inlaid with metal.

3. Gilbert Rohde (designer); Fashion

of the Future;

photograph by Anton Bruehl for Vogue magazine, February 1939: "Man of the next century willrevolt against shaving and wear a beautiful beard ....His hat willbe an antenna ....

His socks, disposable. His suit minus tie, collar, buttons."

5. Harold L. Van Doren and J.G. Rideout (designers);

radio set (in the steppedback shape of New York skyscrapers) manufactured by Air-King Products Company, Brooklyn. New York; 1930-33; 30 x 23 x 19 em.

6. Isamu Noguchi; Portrait 4. Erik Magnussen

(designer); "Cubic" coffee set manufactured by Gorham Company, Providence, Rhode Island; 1927; silver with gilt and oxidized panels.

of R. Buckminster

Fuller;

chrome-plated bronze; 33 x 18 x 24 em.

1927;

America, to invigorate America .... " Although not its aim, the exhibition brought into focus the significant changes in American lifestyles, in its art and culture, between the I 920s, referred to as the Roaring Twenties and Coolidge Prosperity, and the 1930s, a decade of the Great Depression and New Deal. As Willis observed, "Of course, one couldn't expect the curators to state this directly ... they effectively discourage any such observations by blending work of different decades ... designs of the 1920s are more urban and upperclass, feature rich materials and traditional craftsmanship, and reflect influences absorbed from Parisian art, either avant-garde or Moderne. Designs of the 1930s, by contrast, are inspired by mametal, middle-class, and machine-made-or chines, with sleek lines and an image of speed or economy."

Again what the exhibition revealed without stating it, Willis added, was "the democratization of both machines and the machine aesthetic during the 1930s through advertising, marketing, and mass consumption."

"The Machine Age in America," to quote Russell once more, "was an event... that doubled as a chapter from the unpublished autobiography of America."

0

A 1935 Chrysler Airflow automobile and 1929 Davis D1-W airplane on display at "The Machine Age in America, 1918-1941."

The World According to Disney Disney World has been the escape capital of America for two decades. This fantasy playground, constructed on a vast bog near the city of Orlando in central Florida, opened in 1971 with the Magic Kingdom-a mix of carnival rides, amusements, and live entertainment based largely on the settings and characters made famous in the cartoons of Walt Disney. The pioneer cartoonist and filmmaker never saw the opening of the enchanted world he conceived-he died in I966-but his inspiration and imagination continue to guide its development.

The Magic Kingdom has since been joined by two other theme parks-Epcot Center, a series of pavilions with high-tech displays, and the Disney-MGM Studios Theme Park, which features working movie sets and special-effects demonstrations.

Fantasy themes extend beyond the park to an assortment of hotels that are part of the 2,830-hectare complex. Awardwinning, postmodernist architect Michael Graves (see SPAN November 1990) designed the Walt Disney World Dolphin (featuring a pair of six-story-tall dolphins) and the Walt Disney Below left: A huge, spiraling replica of the hereditarydetermining DNA molecule is under construction at Epcot

World Swan (topped by two giant swan statues), hotels that opened within the past year. Disney imagineers, as its planners are called, have seven more hotels and some 29 more attractions on the drawing boards, including an office park, a futuristic city, and a fourth theme park.

Disney World's success is attributed not only to the imagination of its planners, but also to its management style. Strict attention is paid to every operational detail, employees are well trained, conservation practices scrupulously followed, and emphasis placed on services and courtesy. Not surprisingly, Disney World, which attracts 30 million visitors a year, has been an economic boom for central Florida. Disney provides 32,000 jobs and indirectly is responsible for thousands more.

The Orlando area boasts more hotel rooms than any other city in America, including New York, and its international airport, with direct flights from Frankfurt, Germany, is the nation's fastest growing, for Disney World is open every day of the year 0 for fun seekers of all ages.

Center. Below: Handsome Hathaway Brown spins yarns aboUl his "world travels" in the Mask Room of the Adventurers Club.

Left: Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, and their friends pelform regularly at Mickey's Starland Theater.

Left to right above: Spaceship Earth and The Land pavilions provide the backdrop to the 58G-room Beach Club Resort Hotel; everyday is New Year's Eve on Disney's Pleasure Island, where partygoers can find dancing, music, and entertainment; Winnie the Pooh, Eeyore, and Tigger are part of the new "Disney Character Hit Parade" in the Magic Kingdom. Left: Epcot Center's World Showcase pavilions feature a wide variety of international acts.

Back cover: Kermit the Frog and Miss Piggy greet fans daily at Disney World, a tradition begun years ago by the famous Mouses,