Bill Eden, age 42, had graduated from college following the Korean War, during which he
had served as a first-class petty officer in the U.S. Navy. He was fortunate in not being required to
take the labs associated with his major field, electrical engineering, at a large midwestern university
because his full-time, 40-hour-per-week job was in the university's research laboratory.
In spite of the tremendous work load he managed to complete the requirements for a
bachelor's degree in three years. His wife, whom he met and married while they were in the Navy,
also obtained her degree. Following graduation Bill continued n as an engineer in the research
laboratory, doing basic development work for the defense effort. A year later he accepted a position
with a large West Coast aircraft manufacturer where he was placed in charge of a group preparing
technical manuals. He left there in 1967 to accept a position with Sturdivant Electric Corporation as
project engineer in the systems section. Bill had been dissatisfied with his prior job, in part because of a golfing friendship that had developed between one of his subordinates and his boss. The
subordinate's professional loyalty had appeared open to question and Bill felt that he used the golf
cours ~o further his own cause.
With Sturdivant, Eden did an excellent job of coordinating the many system functions
assigned to him. Prior to his coming, the entire design department had grown very rapidly. This,
coupled with the new personnel's lack of familiarity with sys tem concepts and requirements, the
steady progress in design of the many hardware components of the system, and the pressure of early
design and dates, had created impetus for assigning the detailed coordinating responsibility to one
person who could work with all of the design sections and gather, sort, analyze, and evaluate data
and design considerations. With the help of two assistant engineers, Eden accomplished the desired
results. He continued in this capacity until the promotion of the former computer project engineer
created the vacancy into which he moved.