This is so true. You have to remember that finances were really tight at this time. The University budget was getting cut left and right throughout the history of Gopher's evolution. At one point there were plans to outsource everyone to the Minnesota Supercomputer Institute.

Of course in hindsight obtaining grants or forming a partnership with a non-profit org or an academic department might have been a better choice, especially for all the professional services requests.

edit: Also you have to remember that computing was a LOT more expensive then. I have old quotes for SparcStations and RS/6000s that were in the 0-40k range, even with an educational discount.. The Mac IIci's were not cheap either ~k when loaded up with RAM.