Harvard first learned of Wilson's interest in moving to the University in the living room of Vice President Al Gore '69 in February 1995.
According to Gates, the Clinton administration gathered a group of leading scholars on race in America to discuss the upcoming presidential election.
As he did each time he saw Wilson for five years, Gates asked the sociologist when he was coming to Harvard.
Wilson responded that if Gates and the University were serious, the time just might be right to make the move. A year later, Wilson announced he would be a Harvard professor.
Like Wilson, Gates and the Afro-Am department have set their sites on having a powerful voice in social policy debates.
Wilson may well be the key to success.
As President Clinton has said many times, "[The Truly Disadvantaged] made me see the problems of race and poverty in the inner-city in a different light."