Describes the meteoric rise of the National Endowment for the Humanities from a small, unnoticed federal agency in 1965 to one of the nation's largest grant-making institutions. Chairman of NEH from 1971 until 1977, Ronald Berman offers a unique 'insider's' view of the behind-the-scenes maneuvers that resulted in a five fold increase in Federal funding for NEH during his tenure as Chairman.