8 I FRIENDS AND RELATIVES 41 177 



^/he I 



HE MBL SPIRIT is not confined to a few acres of MBL property. Rather, 

 _±_ because the spirit is characterized by a free and cooperative exchange of 

 ideas and beyond usual boundaries, the long-term development of many 

 ties to other people and other institutions spreads that spirit uddely. 



Most obviously, thousands of students have spent time here in hun- 

 dreds of courses. Thousands of instructors have taught those courses. 

 Thousands of investigators have pursued research here joined by a host of 

 workers and visitors and library readers and staff members. The fact that 

 Japan's Emperor Hirohito chose, of all places, to visit the MBL attests to its 

 sphere of influence. People from all over come through for tours of the 

 place they have heard about. Not all the people who have become part of the 

 MBL's 100 years have stayed long; but they nonetheless visit the place and 

 take away something, if only a photograph or T-shirt and a vague sense of 

 what goes on in this place of science, which they then describe to friends 

 back home. 



In the 1920s, Theodore Dreiser visited the MBL at the urging of a friend 

 from the Rockefeller Foundation. He found just what his friend had prom- 

 ised: an exceptional place. Expounding in a manner typical of the period, he 

 enthused about what he saw as the unbiased and pure work before him. As 

 he put it, "The patience, earnestness, and, I assume, honesty of these men 

 and women impress me more than anything else I have seen in America." 

 The community was embarked, he thought, on a marvelous and beautiful 

 search, "the most honorable and respectable employment of man," like 

 going into battle or like hunting or exploring a house vvdth locked doors and 

 no keys. "My compliments to the workers of the Marine Biological Labo- 

 ratory of Woods Hole! A profound and reverent obeisance." 



As the century progressed and the "ring of marine stations around the 

 globe" that Naples station director Anton Dohrn once envisioned has 

 gradually appeared, many people have appealed to the MBL for advice and 

 guidance. Naples set the standard at first, with superior facilities and 

 equipment. But at Naples, investigators worked in their wonderfully quiet 



