Greetings on your 80th birthday. Hard to believe so much time has passed since we started to work together forty years ago. Indeed it was in September 1956 that I arrived at Brown University as an Assistant Professor and you were part of the "establishment" there. At the suggestion of Dan Drucker, then Chairman of the Engineering Division, I jumped into experimental work and found it fascinating.
Looking back, I think the experimental work we did together was fairly important to the development of the field of Dynamic Plasticity of Structures. The situation in the field in the late 50s, the 60s and even in the 70s was much less clear than it is today, and well planned and carefully performed experimentation did much to clarify the situation. I think we both derived considerable satisfaction from those efforts.
On this occasion, I wish to offer my congratulations to you on the totality of your important work on Dynamic Plasticity of Structures. Your work not only motivated other investigators but was directly useful to practicing engineers which is really the end objective of academics in the field of engineering.
With all best wishes for your continued ability to be scientifically active.