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8Developing a passion for statisticsBruce G. LindsayDepartment of StatisticsPennsylvania State University, University Park, PAThis chapter covers the major milestones of the early years of my career instatistics. It is really the story of the transitions I made, from early uncertaintyabout my choice of career and my level of talent, up to crossing the tenureline and realizing that I had not only been deemed a success, I had a passionfor the subject. The focus will be on aspects of those adventures that seemmost relevant to young people who are partway along the same journey.8.1 IntroductionI have had a long career in the academic world of statistics, something like40 years. I have seen the whole process from many points of view, includingeight years as a department head. I have supervised 30 PhD students. I wouldhope that from all that experience I might have forged something worthwhileto say here, something not found in a research paper. I have chosen to focuson the early part of my career, as those are the days of major transitions.For those of you early in your career, there are many choices to make as younavigate this world. It starts with the choice of statistics for your education,then a graduate school, then an advisor, then a topic for the thesis, then aplace of employment. This is done while clearing a series of hurdles meant toseparate the qualified from the unqualified, starting with entrance exams andending with tenure. In this essay I will review some of these critical momentsin my early career. With each of these milestones, I gained some wisdom aboutstatistics and myself, and went from being an unsure young man to being apassionate scholar of statistics.Since I joined Penn State in 1979 I have been paid to do cutting edgeresearch that makes my university famous. I therefore have welcomed thisrare opportunity to look backward instead of forward, and think about theroots of my career. One aspect of academic life that has been frustrating to83