The Building of a Corporation

Henry Singleton and George Roberts met as young plebes and roommates at the US Naval Academy at Annapolis in 1935, beginning a life long friendship and over three decades of a close and remarkably productive business association.

From Annapolis, Henry went on to pursue his interests in mathematics and the newly emerging technology of semiconductor electronics at MIT, where he received his doctorate. Then after a series of jobs with GE, Hughes, North American, and finally Litton--where he developed a unique two axis gyroscope for inertial guidance that revolutionized air, missile and space navigation--he founded the Teledyne Corporation in 1960 with his friend and MIT colleague George Kozmetsky. From his initial focus on aerospace and electronics, Henry began a decade long period of acquisitions that supported those fields, and diversified the company in many ways.

George Roberts, meanwhile, earned a doctorate in metallurgy at Carnegie Mellon University, and went to work for the Vanadium Alloys Steel Company in Latrobe, Pennsylvania, a highly specialized producer of precision alloys used in critical aerospace, industrial and nuclear applications. He quickly rose through the ranks to become its president. In 1966, the two friends, who had remained in contact over the years, agreed that a merger of their companies would be profitable to both. With that merger George became President of Teledyne, with Henry as Teledyne's Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of the Board.

This book is George Roberts' memoir of how they built Teledyne into a 4 billion dollar corporation that was at times controversial, but unerringly successful in providing high financial returns to those shareholders who remained with them through their amazing journey.