Russell

The Varian boys attended grammar school in Pale Alto and high school near Halcyon. Russell left to work his way through Stanford University to a bachelor's degree in physics, which he received in 1925. Two years later this was followed by a master's degree - a considerable achievement for someone who, as a boy, had been held back by a few years at school because of his appallingly had reading and spelling, caused possibly by dyslexia. This awful spelling was to stay with him for life. It was sheer persistence and a refined intelligence that saw him through. Even his career as a student got off to a bad start as surgery and illness wrote off his first year.

Ideally the next step would have been a Ph.D., and a life in academic research, but that was not to be. Sigurd was ill with tuberculosis and his parents needed financial help from their eldest son. Bell Labs turned him down but he got a job, for six months, with Bush Electric in San Francisco. This was followed by a research post with an oil company in Texas. After five months he was dismissed, almost certainly because of personality clashes with his employer. It was some compensation, however, that he had been awarded his first patent.

Back in San Francisco he was offered a position with the Farnsworth Television Laboratory. This was 1930, and America's economic structure was in chaos. But television research was progressing in several places and Philo T. Farnsworth's image dissector was acknowledged as one of the leading contenders. Russell Varian was delighted to join in the fun, even when a change of financial backer meant a move to Philadelphia. By mid-1933, though, problems between Farnsworth and Philco, the new backer, led to Famsworths pulling out and shutting down. RCA went on to win the race to produce electronic television in America and Russell returned to Stanford. He applied to study for his long-awaited Ph.D. and was astonished when he was turned down.

At 36 years of age, his future had collapsed. He trained as a teacher but never took up the profession. Instead, at the university he did some tutoring here, some marking there, and what research he could. This prompted Sigurd to ask. "Is Russell figuring on making money out of scientific papers, or is he just going to advance the cause of science for nothing?"

Sigurd

Sigurd Fergus Varian left school in 1920 and registered at California Polytechnic but quickly dropped out He was far too adventurous for the academic life. His contribution was not to be the original researcher but the developer and implementer of ideas, the man who got them to work. With a friend, he set up his own business as an electrician, but then joined the Southern California Edison Company. When stringing high power lines near a small airfield, Sig (as he was known) became fascinated by the aeroplanes. Soon he was receiving flying lessons at $4 each. It was the start of a life-long love affair. After two months he could write home, "I can make a peach of a landing".

In August 1924 Sigurd bought a wartime biplane. Soon the plane was earning money with stunt flying, advertising, selling lessons and giving joy rides. But by now tuberculosis had struck for the first of several times and six months rest was needed to clear his lungs. The next year he hired himself out to an electricity company as a flying serviceman and used his plane in other ways to earn a living. By 1926 regulations for flying were being introduced and Sig. and his plane were duly licensed.

The life he was leading took its toll, however, and tuberculosis struck again. This time it was severe and Sigurd spent a year in a sanatorium, a severe trial for one with a driving, adventurous nature. When he finally accepted his fate he used some of his invalid time to plan for the future and study aerial navigation. He also made his first request to Russell to help improve aircraft navigation instruments: a radio compass was their first serious project, though it did not work out.

Sigurd decided it was time to get a regular job with an airline. He was an excellent pilot and was signed up by Pan American for its subsidiary in Mexico.

The job turned out to be extremely well paid and had more than its fair share of excitement, with hunts for emergency landing sites, revolutions and other thrills. He also met and married Winifred Hogg, the daughter of the British consul in Vera Cruz and who, years later, was to make that blackberry jam. Mexico was also where Sigurd learned about the hazards of aircraft navigation and the need for aids, especially for blind landings. The threat of another war in Europe worried him and he pondered how approaching aircraft could be detected. Meanwhile the postmen carried letters to and fro between the brothers as they exchanged ideas for inventions and businesses.

By 1935, Sigurd was ready for a change. He took six months' leave and he and Winnie headed for Halcyon and a home laboratory which he set up and shared with' Erie and Russell.