Octave Levenspiel is Emeritus Professor of Chemical Engineering at Oregon State University, with primary interests in the design of chemical reactors. He was born in Shanghai, China and started out wanting to study astronomy, but somehow found himself in chemical engineering. He studied at U. C. Berkeley and at Oregon State University where he received his Ph.D. in 1952. His pioneering book, “Chemical Reaction Engineering” was the very first in the field, has numerous foreign editions and has been translated into 13 foreign languages. He has received major awards from A.I.Ch.E. and A.S.E.E., three honorary doctorates: from Nancy, France; from Belgrade, Serbia; from the Colorado School of Mines; and he has been elected to the National Academy of Engineering. Of his numerous writings and research papers, two have been selected as Citation Classics by the Institute of Scientific Information. But what pleases him most is being called the “Doctor Seuss” of chemical engineering.