The other most important person for this foreign student was definitely Mrs. Mamie Lily. She was the stockroom keeper. She was well organized and kept the stockroom like her closet, neat and spotless. Most importantly, she knew where to locate everything. This was very different from the stockrooms I knew at National Taiwan University. Her place was the gathering center for all lab assistants (both graduate and undergraduate students) and teachers. We usually took our breaks there, had our donuts and drinks there, etc. She brought treats to the stockroom regularly and she even invited me to meet her husband and an adopted daughter. She was kind in every way I could imagine. I feel very badly that I do not have a picture of her, even though her cheerful image is fixed in my mind forever.
Another important person was my thesis director, Mr. Clifford Boyd, who was an analytical chemist. At that juncture of the department, there was no physical chemist on board who was active in publishing. Mr. Boyd was active so I decided to choose him, even though he was not in my field of interest. He worked with me and I got some opportunities to play with a polarograph machine. Since most of the courses at ETSU were quite easy for me, I took as many courses as possible every quarter. By the end of the 1963 fall quarter, after just four quarters, I had finished all my requirements and my thesis. A master’s degree in this time frame was probably a record at ETSU. At the beginning of 1964 I started a full time job at Great Lakes Research.
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