For the last thirteen years, the Chicago Section of the Society for Applied Spectroscopy has sponsored a symposium in the spring of each year. In this span, the symposia have shown a steady increase in attendance, in the number of papers presented, in the number of sessions, and in the number of days the conference lasted. The duration of the most recent sym posium was four days, with sessions devoted to molecular spectroscopy, including infrared, Raman, ultraviolet, and visible, and to X-ray, NMR, emission, and flame spectroscopy, respectively, with a special session devoted to gas chroma tography because of its growing interest in applied spectro scopic work. Another feature of this last symposium was the attempt on part of the Symposium Committee to establish and maintain the scientific level at that of applied physics. This should place the present symposium at a level somewhere between that of the Ohio State symposium and that of the Pittsburgh meeting, thus approaching the level of applied chemical physics. In addition, the symposium was designed to offer to sci entists from other disciplines and students an opportunity to attend introductory panels and lectures and at the same time the mature investigators a meeting ground and the chance to keep abreast of the latest developments in spectroscopy. How well these aims have been accomplished is best attested to by the phenomenal growth of the symposium.