The Caltech Associates Announce Carl Larson As New President

PASADENA—The Associates of the California Institute of Technology are pleased to announce alumnus Carl Larson as their new president for 1996. He succeeds Warren Schlinger, who served as president in 1995. Larson's one-year term began at the January meeting of the Associates' Board of Directors. Coincidentally, 1996 marks the Associates' seventieth anniversary.

Larson graduated from Caltech in 1952 with a degree in mechanical engineering. After leaving Caltech, he worked for four years as a U.S. Air Force weather forecaster in Korea, Japan, and Taiwan. He then went to work for Varian Associates, a Palo Alto, California, electronics company, where he worked first as an engineer but later moved into marketing. He attended Stanford Business School on a part-time basis from 1957 to 1959. During his years with Varian, from 1956 to 1974, Larson worked primarily in marketing. His accomplishments included helping to start a Varian plant in Italy and running a Varian subsidiary involved in fostering minority-owned businesses. In 1974, he joined Versatec to work in advertising and marketing. He stayed with the company after it was bought by Xerox, and retired from his position as a vice president of Versatec in 1987.

Larson is the first president of the Associates to reside outside of the Los Angeles area. There are over one hundred Associates in the San Francisco Bay area. Larson lives with his wife, Shirley, in Portola Valley, California. They have two grown children.

The Associates is a support group for Caltech with members throughout the United States. The president's duties consist of presiding over the semiannual meetings of the board of directors and of the executive committee, which customarily meets five times a year or more. The president advises and works closely with the executive director of the Associates in implementing the policies of the Associates' Board of Directors.

Members of the Associates enjoy monthly programs with Caltech faculty, including luncheons, dinners, on-campus tours of labs, and yearly trips to sites such as the Keck Observatory in Hawaii. Associates have the opportunity to be members of the Athenaeum, the campus faculty club. Members also have use of the Caltech libraries, and the Institute's athletic facilities are available for a yearly fee. Regional events are held in San Francisco, Santa Barbara, and San Diego. For further membership information, contact the Associates Office at (818) 395-3919.

Contact: Sue Pitts (818) 395-3227 pitts@caltech.edu