The occurrence of superconductivity among the d- and f-band metals remains one of the unsolved problems of physics. The first Rochester conference on this subject in October 1971 brought together approximately 100 experimentalists and theorists, and that conference was considered successful; the published proceedings well-represented the current research at that time and has served as a "handbook" to many. In the four and one half years since the first conference, impressive progress has been made in many areas (although Berndt Matthias would be one of the first to point out that raising the m"aximum transition temperature by a significant amount was not one of them). For a variety of reasons, I decided that it was time for a Second Rochester Conference on Superconductivity in d- and f-Band Metals and it was held on April 30 and May 1, 1976. It would appear that this conference was even more successful judging from the quality of the talks and various comments made to me. I believe that this was due to the fact that the subject matter is exciting and that the timing was particularly appropriate for several areas of research that were discussed.
However, I cannot rule out other factors such as the one advanced humorously by J.