Donald G. Fink was born in Englewood, N.J. on 8 November 1911 and attended the public schools there. While in high school he developed two interests that were to shape his future career: he was licensed as a radio amateur in 1928 and served two years as editor of the school newspaper. In 1929 he entered the Massachusetts Institute of Technology to study electrical engineering. Two years later he studied the then new field of electronics under Professor Truman Gray, in the first college course so designated. Concurrently he was appointed editor of the M.I.T. undergraduate technical journal. In 1934 he joined the editorial staff of the magazine ELECTRONICS. There, under the tutelage of Orestes Caldwell and Keith Henney, he was encouraged to take a special interest in the then emerging field of television. By 1940 he was ready to publish Principles of Television Engineering one of the first textbooks in the field.