“When you are in your sixties today, you are still a relatively young person. But I find that when you sit down to write about your life, you sure do feel old.” This quote is from Rich Hoffner, a member of my hobby club The Universal Ship Cancellation Society. These words reflect my feeling on this matter very well.

In the last newsletter, I mentioned a number of my coworkers at LVE. I was thinking about how many people, even senior researchers, remember them. Surely they would remember myself and John Coulburn and many others would remember Bill Jones. But how about Paul Donahue and Skip Mickey? In any case, these people at LVE were responsible for the basis of our modern behavioral control systems. John Coulbourn was very innovative in creation of new products. His background as a technician at Maryland gave him insight into what was required in the lab. One of the products he was responsible for was the human modular test system. It was a system that a non-technical researcher could configure by themselves. When he formed Coulbourn Instruments he continued these ideas with the animal modular test chamber (the standard everyone uses today). I was more interested in the computer control and data acquisition systems. At the time this was a much more practical approach, as the market was ripe for computer control systems. In the 1960s his company, Coulbourn Instruments, had extraordinary growth and earnings. Meanwhile at MED I was designing human computer based physiological systems. Our early growth at MED was rather slow to say the least.

Getting back to LVE, there was an extraordinary amount of talent that led to equally impressive product innovation. The very large research budgets at this time resulted in good sales for instrumentation companies, and this allowed companies to fund their growth through their earnings. I recall that my boss at Villanova, Gunter Reith, had a budget of about $50,000. This was a lot of money for the early 1960s. Gunter and I later went on to LVE. At LVE there was an extensive R&D staff, a good sales staff and full manufacturing capabilities (machine shop, sheet metal shop and circuit board fabrication). The President and owner, Al Simpson, had put together a company that could have been a major force in instrumentation for behavioral sciences. There were even employee stock sales, options and a retirement plan. Unfortunately for the employees who bought stock, it was non-voting. So when BRS, a lesser company in the behavioral area, came along with a good offer to buy LVE, Al Simpson took the offer and headed for Japan.

A lot of this early instrumentation is still around. Recently I noticed these items in a hallway at UCLA. The Grasson Stadler Noise Generator is shown below, along with the Scientific Prototypes Feeder, another interesting device from times past.

Grasson Stadler Noise Generator

Scientific Prototypes Feeder

Back to the present: MED Associates was recently honored as the “Business of the Year” by the Franklin Grand Isle Workforce Investment Board for our work in mentoring students. During the summer we train students in our labs and production facilities. This program has worked out very well for the students and MED Associates/Catamount Research & Development. Our award is shown below, along with part of the presentation text.

“…Today we are honoring Karl Zurn, his family and his business for the incredible opportunities that they offer our workers right here in Franklin County. Over the years the Zurn family and their capable management team has supported many local endeavors. This past year they have stepped up to support an effort that directly affects the young workforce that Vermont so critically needs to capture. The solid commitment that Karl and Bridget Zurn, Gerry Herrera, and Chip Thibault, have made to the Franklin County Internship program has set the stage for all other businesses to follow. MED Associates has made a “super promise” to our youth in the internship program; a promise that goes beyond the general promise that many of us have made as individuals, businesses and educational leaders.” •

Sincerely,

Karl R. Zurn, M.E.E.