A Portrait of Sid Stein
Mike Stein
Sid Stein personified his family's hopes and dreams for America. And he delivered.
Max Stein, my grandfather, arrived at Ellis Island alone in 1912 intending to work (he was a skilled tailor), and bring his wife, Bella, and five children from Poland within two years. The Great War and a devastated Europe resulted in his family finally arriving in 1920. Sidney was born in 1921.
None of Sidney's brothers or sisters finished high school.
Most lived at their Sackman Street, Brooklyn, duplex (even
after marriage) and all were part of the workforce during
the Great Depression, a family of seven potential breadwinners.
(And then six: at some point the oldest sister, Sadie,
died in childbirth.) Even during the worst of The Depression
at least two Steins worked, making them relatively prosperous
- able to feed less fortunate extended family or friends,
and able to insist that Sidney stay in school. He was
encouraged by a high school teacher (one of those unsung
heroes) to study chemistry at Brooklyn College.
 In college Sidney met my mother on the cheerleading squad. (They got into ball games for free.) Bunny, whose background was remarkably similar to Sidney's, was only 16 when she started college. (Many of you know how bright and assertive she still is.) I get the impression that an understanding was reached between them early on, including the decision that a decent income must precede marriage.
With World War II several brothers joined the Armed Forces. But the newly graduated chemistry major was invited by his college professor, Joe Greenspan, to join him on the Manhattan Project, developing isotope separation equipment for later installation at Oak Ridge.
Sid remembers hearing that the bombs had been dropped and that the Japanese had surrendered. "We were thrilled knowing we had shortened the war, saved lives." He was decorated for his work.
He won fellowships for his masters and doctorate degrees
at Brooklyn (now New York) Polytechnic Institute in physical
chemistry – a level of income in excess of that ever
earned by his father or brothers. Sponsored by Wrigley
and under the great Herman Mark, he developed equipment
to test the elasticity of synthetic substitutes for chickle
in chewing gum.
Sid's first entrepreneurial effort was a detergent business. With Alex Sacher, another Ph.D. candidate, Sid would mix chemicals in barrels by rolling them on their Sackman Street driveway and then peddled them to Laundromats. But they wouldn't sell: the detergent cleaned the clothes but it wouldn't make suds. The customers wanted suds.
Other than family, Brooklyn had no appeal for my parents. (Mother remembers the Murder Incorporated gang hanging out at the corner candy store.) So in 1949 Sid accepted the offer of Philadelphia resistor manufacturer IRC. It was a big move; no one had cars. Sid became Director of Research and Engineering in 1951.
Ten years later, now with four children and having been passed over for the IRC presidency ("You're the best man but you're just too young"), Sid left IRC for Apollo Industries, a company which bought small distressed technology companies, returned them to profitability and sold them. Sid became their company fixer-upper. On weekends he worked on his own dream: a company devoted to screen printed materials for passive components, interconnections and packaging (an approach that had been considered at his urging but then largely dismissed by IRC).
Electro-Science Laboratories was incorporated in February, 1962. Sidney's earliest employees include former IRC colleagues Catherine Schreiber (then Wilkins), Steve Rollin (later the co-founder of EMC Technology), Loretta Spadafora and Connie Huang (both still executives at ESL).
Steve remembers ESL's first location, Arch Street, Philadelphia, as being in the midst of the region's fastest growing pornography market. Rents were cheap. Cathy remembers they had almost no money. Sid worked seven days a week. She remembers when he brought in ESL's first repeat order. "GE wants another jar of 2209," she told Steve Rollin. Steve wasn't sure he could make it again. "I don't have a recipe. I just mixed something up." He apparently mixed something up again, successfully.
I remember when Dad stopped working Sundays. One Sunday morning in maybe 1966 I was surprised to see his car was still parked out front of the house. My brothers, sister and I nevertheless remember Dad as always being present, interested and loving.
It was in the late 60s that Don Southerland, Lou Hoffman, George Lane, Dan Hughes, Wayne Martin, Don Hamer, Sid and other brave, smart people started educating each other in earnest about the advantages of hybrids: of combining various electronics technologies (thick film, thin film, PCB, monolithic) for optimization of cost, turnaround scale up and performance. It was the beginning of ISHM. With its novel advantages of rapid prototyping, simplicity and cost, thick film became the focus of much of the Society's activities. Richard Tait, a 30-year ESL-Europe veteran, recalls a European microelectronics industry hungry for information and Sid, Lou, and George, fierce but friendly competitors, turned up at every conference to spread the "thick film" word. Those seminars, whether in Paris, Milan or Copenhagen, were always standing room only.
It was on one of those early trips to London that Sid convinced the president of Johnson Matthey to sponsor the first UK ISHM Conference; thus was born the first European Chapter. Many others followed; Sid was instrumental in encouraging most of them, including those in Eastern Europe. (In the 80s while still under the Soviets, those engineers were hungry for meaningful contact with the West.)
Appreciations, plaques and awards to Sid also flowed in from chapters he helped found in Japan, Taiwan, Korea, Singapore and India. There was a joke that Sid spoke fluent English in 20 different languages. (His legacy of "giving back" is a compelling one; I was humbled by it when playing a small part in helping the Israel chapter get started several years ago.)
Many more of his awards say "Best Paper of __";
Sid has written and presented papers literally hundred
of times and has always been more focused on sharing technical
information than on product advertising (sometimes, I
admit, to my frustration).
He has served as ISHM's (then IMAPS's) International Liaison, has been perennially active on the finance committee, and co-founded the IMAPS Educational Foundation, a story familiar to many. He also ran a pretty successful company: ESL and its affiliates have been very profitable for almost 40 years and have grown without the need for outside investors or significant debt. (His aversion to depending on outsiders' money, since passed on to me, was born of those Depression years and has served us well.)
True to form, Dad became the generous patriarch of our extended family, knowing he could never repay the siblings who insisted on his education but he has always tried, one way or another.
Also, he and my mother became philanthropists and through their personal Foundation have given millions to charities.
And, nearing 80, he still comes to work, still shakes our complacency, punctures our hubris, pats our backs.
IMAPS Educational Foundation Changes Name to Honor Sid Stein
The Board of Trustees of the IMAPS Educational Foundation has voted to change the name of the Foundation to the Dr. Sidney J. Stein Educational Foundation. The change was made to honor Dr. Stein's role as a founding member of the Foundation and his many years of service to our industry.
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