Commission 45 is solidly anchored in the beginnings of the IAU. It evolved out of Commission 29, which was one of the original commissions and whose title and emphasis was the Spectral Classification of Stars (Transactions of the IAU, Volume I, 1922). C29 was formed with W.S. Adams (Pasadena) as president. Its first members were Miss Cannon, R.H. Curtiss, A. Fowler, A. de Gramont, M. Hamy, H.F. Newall, J.S. Plaskett, H.N. Russell, all very much part of the history of stellar spectroscopy. In the 1922 Transactions report it was recognized the Harvard System of spectral classification “has already been adopted by international agreement. . .”