STANFORD UNIVERSITY

STANFORD, CALIFORNIA

DEPARTMENT OF BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES

December 7, 1956

Dr. Joshua Lederberg
Department of Genetics
University of Wisconsin
Madison, Wisconsin

Dear Dr. Lederberg:

I was very pleased to learn from our telephone conversation
that you might be interested in considering an offer to succeed Ed Tatum
in this Department. I can assure you on behalf of the Department that
there is no one whom we would rather appoint to this position, and that
you would be very warmly received here,

I have been authorized by the administration to offer you a
full professorship at a salary of $12,000. If this salary is inadequate
I would attempt to make any necessary adjustment, but can give no assur-
ances on this point at present. I believe you and your wife are familiar
with Ed Tatum's laboratory, and accordingly have some impression of the
facilities that would be immediately available. I anticipate no diffi-
culty in making any additional provisions that might be necessary in this
regard,

As in most private universities, the Department depends largely
on research funds obtained from outside sources. However, the Department
does have at its disposal sizeable long-term grants from the Rockefeller
and Fleischmann foundations which enable us to provide rather liberally
for the purchase of equipment and supplies and to contribute at least
modestly toward the salaries of research assistants. Particularly during
your first year or two here, until you could transfer existing research
grants, or obtain new ones of your own, we would be prepared to allocate
several thousand dollars for your own use. In general, we attempt to
conserve the Rockefeller and Fleischmann funds for important emergency use,
and for younger members of the staff who are not yet sufficiently well
established to obtain funds readily from outside sources.

Your wife would be accorded full privileges and appointed as
Research Biologist, an appointment which carries no University salary but
entitles the holder to the other advantages that go with faculty standing.

You would encounter no difficulty in working out a teaching
assignment that would be agreeable to you. As you may know, we operate on
the quarter system at Stanford, and ordinarily Ed Tatum has taught a lec-
ture course during one quarter and conducted a seminar during one of the
other two quarters of the regular academic year.
Stanford University

Dr. Joshua Lederberg December 7, 1956

Retirement annuities at Stanford are handled through the T.I.A.A.
According to a new arrangement that is certain to go into effect next year,
the University deducts 5% from each salary for this purpose, and contributes
from its own funds twice this amount.

You may be interested in the matter of University housing, and
for your information I am enclosing a statement of the provisions for
financing existing campus residences and the construction of new ones. I
consider these provisions to be quite liberal, constituting a rather sub-
stantial "fringe benefit."

If you consider it desirable to visit the campus before arriving
at a decision, the University would be pleased to invite you and your wife
at its expense. In this connection, I should explain that I am at present
on sabbatical leave until spring quarter, and will leave Stanford some time
between the 20th and 25th of this month. Unless, however, there are
important specific details that you would need to work out with me during
your visit, I am sure that Dave Perkins and other members of the Department
could attend to your entertainment and answer most of your questions.

There is another consideration that may be of interest to you.
The Stanford M:dical School will soon be moving to the campus, and this will
very substantially increase the size and quality of the local scientific
community. Establishment of a new Department of Biochemistry, and strength-
ening of the other preclinical departments, will be of particular importance
to the enlargement of biological activity on the campus,

The relations within the Biology Department are very friendly,
and I am sure both you and your wife would find a congenial environment

bere,

With best regards,

Victor Twitty .}

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