THE ROCKEFELLER UNIVERSITY
1230 YORK AVENUE NEW YORK. MEW YORK 10021-6399

OFFICE OF THE PRESIDENT

August 7, 1989

Dr. Elizabeth Sherman

Office of the Home Secretary
National Academy of Sciences
Washington

Dear Dr. Sherman

It is a pleasure to endorse Dr. Paul Berg’s nomination of Arnold O. Beckman for the
National Academy of Sciences Public Welfare Medal. His services to the Academy need no
further documentation on my part. Dr. Beckman’s career as an inventor and entrepreneur,
civic leader and philanthropist are equally worthy of the Academy’s Tecognition. The
Beckman Instruments Company which is so much his personal creation has become a
formidable part of U.S. technology, a worthy exemplar from both an economic and
technological standpoint. Those instruments are truly indispensable both to the conduct of
biomedical and chemical research, and to life-saving medical diagnostic procedures; and they
are also widely used in process control in a wide range of manufacturing industries. We give
great credit to scientists for their creative accomplishment, and tend to neglect those who have
developed the instrumentation that is so often crucial for those advances.

His leadership as Chairman of Caltech’s Board of Trustees on which he served for over
twenty years and chaired for ten was an important supporting function for one of the world’s
premier scientific institutions. More recently he has engaged in a program of philanthropic
support for scientific research at a range of academic institutions which is notable not only for
its breathtaking magnitude but for the good taste and intensity of discriminating judgment that
Dr. Beckman has exercised in a very personal way.

Dr. Beckman has remarked to me what a difficult choice he faced as between an
entrepreneurial and an academic career shortly after his invention and marketing of the first
electronic pH meter. My response, at a symposium held here in honor of his 85th birthday
was:

"The news of science usually concems what results a scientist has achieved, not
how he has found them. The methods and instruments used and developed in
the course of a scientist’s research are rarely considered news. All too often,
the role of instrumentation -- from the tedious steps in design, to commercial
production, to routine maintenance -- is taken for granted in the conduct of a
scientific life. Yet, scientific progress continues to depend on the invention and
refinement of tools and techniques.”

It is hard for me to imagine a worthier candidate for the Public Welfare Medal of
Science, speaking both to his accomplishment and to his qualities as an extraordinarily public
spirited and generous citizen.

Yours sincerely,

Joshua Lederberg