The Georgia Tech Research Institute (GTRI) is the nonprofit applied research arm of the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta, Georgia, United States. GTRI employs around 2,400 people, and is involved in approximately $600 million in research annually for more than 200 clients in industry and government. Initially known as the Engineering Experiment Station, (EES) the organization was proposed in 1929 by W. Harry Vaughan as an analog to the agricultural experiment stations; the Georgia General Assembly passed a law that year creating the organization on paper but did not allocate funds to start it. To boost the state's struggling economy in the midst of the Great Depression, funds were found, and the station was finally established with US$5,000 (equivalent to $ in ) in April 1934. GTRI's research spans a variety of disciplines, including national defense, homeland security, public health, education, mobile and wireless technologies, and economic development. Major customers for GTRI research include United States Department of Defense agencies, the state of Georgia, non-defense federal agencies, and private industry. Overall, contracts and grants from Department of Defense agencies account for approximately 84% of GTRI's total research funding. Since it was established, GTRI has expanded its engineering focus to include science, economics, policy, and other areas that leverage GTRI's partnership with Georgia Tech. GTRI researchers are named on 76 active patents and 43 pending patents. History Establishment After being founded in 1885, Georgia Tech grew from a trade school into a university over several decades. However, there was little state initiative to see the school expand significantly until 1919. That year, in a move similar to the Hatch Act of 1887's establishment of agricultural experiment stations, the federal debate over whether to create engineering experiment stations similarly spurred the Georgia General Assembly to pass an act titled "Establishing State Engineering Experiment Station at the Georgia School of Technology." This station was established with the goal of the "encouragement of industries and commerce" within the state. The federal effort ultimately failed and the state did not finance the organization. In 1929, some Georgia Tech faculty members belonging to Sigma Xi started a Research Club at Tech that met once a month. One of the monthly subjects, proposed by W. Harry Vaughan, was a collection of issues related to Georgia Tech, such as library development, and the development of a state engineering station. This group investigated the forty existing engineering experiment