Page 147 - MY STORY

Applied Research would be accomplished at the

McDonnell Douglas Research Labs (MDRL) in St. Louis.
The corporation ultimately had to close down the
Douglas ARL and lay off senior scientists or find jobs for

them in the mainstream of company efforts. I ended up
with some of the “spillover” from that retrenchment and
suddenly owned about half a dozen scientists as my

reports. What in hell was I supposed to do with these
brains?

There were some jokes circulating out there that tried
explain the difference in the thinking process and

discipline of scientists vs. engineers, but those difference
came home to roost in my branch, and believe me those
differences were clear, unambiguous, and serious. Don’t
get me wrong – many of my top level engineers were

quite capable of doing fundamental science in the solving
of problems, and some scientists are capable of

performing planned work with an associated cost and
schedule – but not typically.

The materials scientists I absorbed from ARL were
brilliant. They were sure as hell smarter than me (that
was not difficult) and a lot of my people, but if we needed

to attack and solve a technical problem or a product