This book is the product of research spanning two decades. In the 1980s I had been investigating the history of cytology in the nineteenth century and biochemistry in the early twentieth century when I responded to an announcement from the American Society for Cell Biology of a fellowship for support of research on the history of cell biology. With their financial support in 1986 and 1987 I began to examine the creation of modern cell biology in the decades after World War II. I am enormously grateful not only for the fellowship funding but also for the invaluable assistance of individuals associated with ASCB. In particular, I thank Robert Trelstad, then Secretary of ASCB, who invited me to society and executive council meetings, gave me encouragement, and provided entrée to senior members of the society. A number of the founders of modern cell biology were still active in the society and I had the opportunity to meet and interview them regarding their own contributions to cell biology and their recollections of the early days of this field. I also had access to the archives of the society, which were then housed at the Society offices. (They have since been transferred to the University of Maryland, Baltimore County.) I have relied heavily on this material in analyzing in Chapter 7 the history of the American Society for Cell Biology.

In the early 1990s I received additional support from the National Endowment for the Humanities.