This symposium, and the special issue of Microscopy & Microanalysis that Barry Carter and Uli Dahmen have put together, provides us with a glimpse of a career that has not only spanned the development of electron microscopy of materials but also helped to drive it. Over the last 40 years Gareth has guided more than a hundred graduate students and over forty post-doctoral fellows, building a foundation for the application of transmission electron microscopy in the United States including the creation of the National Center for Electron Microscopy. It is with great pleasure that we celebrate his 70th birthday, gratified that he is still going strong and marveling at how he does it.