From the New York Hospital, I went to the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda. New York Hospital was noteworthy for us for an important reason. It was where our daughter, Deborah, was born so when we left for Bethesda we had two children, John and, and Deborah, and before we left Bethesda our third child, our second son, Fred, was born. I arrived at the... when I arrived at the NIH, the clinical center still had not been finished. There had been a strike and the fact that it wasn't completed turned out to be one of the most important issues of my life. A friend had sent me to meet a biochemist at the NIH named Bernie Horecker, and because it wasn't possible to begin work in the clinical center I asked Bernie whether he'd have space in his laboratory. He... he told me that his colleague, Arthur Kornberg, had recently left to go to St Louis to Washington University and that he'd have laboratory space. The name Kornberg meant no more to me, at that time, than the name Horecker, and I wasn't above being willing to work in space that Kornberg had... had vacated.

At this time Horecker was working on elucidating the pathway of pentose phosphate metabolism, and that, again, was something completely unfamiliar to me. Bernie said to me, we're now in the process of purifying spinach transketolase. I had no experience with transketolase, some experience with spinach. It seemed like something quite remote from anything that really would ever have any meaning to me, but I joined that project and it was really a stunning experience. Bernie Horecker opened my eyes to what biochemical science can be, opened my eyes to what experimentation can mean, opened my eyes to the... the beauties of science.