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Short-Order Duck. Such are U.S. scientists' short-order wonders, often telescoping into a few months developments which would normally take five years of research from idea to finished product. Perhaps the best example of how Dr. Bush's group works was its famed amphibian truck, the "Duck." The problem: to produce a 2½-ton truck (based on an amphibian jeep previously designed by OSRD) which could run on land and water and do heavy duty in beachhead operations. It was a job at which many had failed; most attempts had simply placed an ordinary truck on pontoons, with dampening results. OSRD assigned the ticklish part of the design, not to a truck maker, but to a firm of yacht designers, Sparkman & Stephens. They were to produce a watertight hull; General Motors, Yellow Trucks, the truck chassis and motor.
Two months later, OSRD's team had put its Duck into production. The Duck has been invaluable in Pacific landing operations. It can carry 35 to 50 men, plows through heavy surf, drives in & out of steep shell holes.
In war-blasé Washington, OSRD is regarded almost with awe. Significantly, this is less because of its scientific accomplishments than because of its smooth operation. OSRD is one of the few executive agencies that in four turbulent years has had no internal quarrels, no tiffs with Congress, no reorganization; its original line-up of top men is still intact. Of course, OSRD, being virtually a military secret, is also virtually invisible. But it is not completely invisible; and much of the credit for its immunity from attack has been due to OSRD's able, self-effacing boss, Vannevar Bush.
Tinkering Yankee. Lean, sharp, salty, 54-year-old Van Bush is a Yankee whose love of science began, like that of many American boys, in a passion for tinkering with gadgets. Born in Everett, Mass., near Boston, grandson of a whaler and son of a Universalist preacher, Bush feels most at home in a Cape Cod fishing boat. Possessed of insatiable curiosity and a prodigious memory, he has solid learning in the more obvious forms of literature (he quotes Kipling and Omar Khayyam by the yard), likes to read philosophy, plays the flute, loves symphonic music, has been a successful farmer and turkey raiser, is a fascinated and fascinating lecturer, and as a scientist has contributed substantially to progress in applied electricity and electronics.
He is rarely without a pipe in his mouth, a pencil in his hand and an idea for "a better way" to do whatever is being done. At home, in peacetime, he relaxed by working in a cellar machine shop building boats, driving a tractor on his New Hampshire farm. Now much too busy to indulge his various hobbies, he nonetheless startled his wife this winter by suddenly taking up late evening basket-weaving.