- "I want unconventional minds. People who see the world differently and aren't constrained by normal methods of problem solving."
- —On the type of scientist he was looking to hire.
In 1943, Vannevar Bush and Major General Leslie Groves interviewed Doc Brown at the Gomez residence, which Doc had arranged to use as his apartment was a mess. The two men realized that the house did not belong to him, and Doc walked back to his apartment thinking he didn't get the position.
When he arrived back at his apartment, J. Robert Oppenheimer told him that using a clean apartment instead of cleaning his own was exactly the out of the box thinking he was looking for in scientists, and awarded Doc a position on the Manhattan Project.