"I was fortunate in having an instructor at the University of Minnesota who was looking after me," recalled one electrical engineering graduate of 1949. "When I said, 'What's next?' he said, 'If I were you, I'd just go down the street here to Engineering Research Associates, and I'd think you'd like what they're doing there'." That was Seymour Cray, and his computer designs helped create a notable computer industry in the Twin Cities. Another Minnesota graduate, Earl Bakken (class of 1948), founded Medtronic and the core of a nationally renowned medical devices industry. For 75 years the...