"Perhaps the most important thing that ever happened to me was that I was born on May 9, 1909, with parents who had just come from Russia a year before I was born. Most of the rest of the period up until the time I graduated from MIT was made possible through the devotion and determination of my father and mother that I should have the opportunity to get a full education in the country they had just become part of. It was their devotion and their dedication and encouragement that made life relatively easy for me the first twenty-five years of life....
They were poor when they arrived, but my father worked very hard and saved money and eventually sent me through MIT as if I were the son of a very rich man....
So, I have my parents to thank for most of this....The fortunate thing that I was born at that time was that the timing was perfect, because when I returned from the army after the Second World War, I had already had a few years of practice at SOM. I already had two degrees from MIT and a Rotch Traveling Fellowship.
So, in 1947 the United States, especially in New York, was starting on a building boom. Clients wanted modern architecture, and here I was at the right age, excited about modernism, and fortunate enough to join Skidmore, Owings & Merrill in 1937 when it consisted of Owings in Chicago and Skidmore in New York with a couple of men. That's the point
 of my being excited about having been born in 1909."

 Gordon Bunshaft
 (1909-1990)