In Memoriam: 2015

Allan W. Johnson, Jr. was a member of the MAA since 1963, and his death was reported to the MAA in 2015. Johnson, who lived in the Washington, DC, area, published articles in several issues of the Journal of Recreational Mathematics on the subject of magic squares.

William H. Warner passed away on December 27, 2015, at the age of 86. He was an emeritus professor at the University of Minnesota following his retirement in 1995, and he was a member of the MAA since 1950. Warner was memorialized by Minnesota’s Aerospace Engineering and Mechanics department, and his obituary can be found here.

George Seifert passed away on December 17, 2015, at the age of 94. He was Emeritus Professor at Iowa State University and a member of the MAA for 54 years. Seifert’s research interests were in ordinary and delay differential equations, and he published about 90 papers on the subject. More information about his life and career can be found in his obituary.

Harold V. McIntosh passed away on November 30, 2015, at the age of 86. McIntosh spent most of his career as a teacher and researcher in Mexico, with his final appointment at the Autonomous University of Puebla, in Mexico. He was a member of the MAA for 46 years. McIntosh is known for his seminar work in cellular automata, as well his use of early computer algebra systems to solve problems in physics. Detailed information about his life and career can be found in this article by Paul McJones, as well as a second article on McIntosh and LISP, and this obituary in the Journal of Cellular Automata.

Harvey M. Weitkamp died on November 18, 2015, at the age of 96. He was a member of the MAA for 58 years and an educator in Cincinnati, Ohio during his career. He was noted as a speaker in 1942 at the University of Cincinnati and at the 1954 meeting of the MAA Ohio Section. More information about his life can be found in his obituary.

Vernise Steadman passed away on November 5, 2015, at the age of 68. Steadman was a professor and department chair at the University of the District of Columbia, and a member of the MAA for 19 years. Steadman received her PhD from Howard University in 1988 and was an expert in functional analysis and differential equations. More information about Dr. Steadman life and career can be found in these online postings.

Carla Dee Moravitz Martin died on October 27, 2015, at the age of 42. Martin was an Applied Research Mathematicians for the National Security Agency when she died, after her work for several years as a professor at James Madison University. Martin’s research area was numerical linear algebra with a focus on Kronecker products and singular value decomposition. As a member of the MAA, Martin was a Project NExT Fellow (2006 – sepia dot), a member of Committee on Business, Industry, and Government Mathematics, and the writer of a well-received article in MAA Focus: “What Can I Do with a Math Degree?” She was also the co-author of the MAA book: Keeping it R.E.A.L.: Research Experiences for all Learners. Extensive information about Martin’s life and career can be found in an obituary published by the SIAM, on this MAA page, and in the Fall 2015 newsletter of the MAA Business-Industry-Government SIGMAA.

Arnold Ostebee passed away on October 11, 2015, at the age of 65. Ostebee was a professor at St. Olaf’s college until his retirement in 2014, and he also served as Assistant Provost at St. Olaf’s for a decade. Ostebee was a member of the MAA since 1981 and served the MAA in a variety of ways. He was associate editor of the American Mathematical Monthly for twelve years, and he led the Professional Enhancement Program workshop “Leading the Academic Department: A Workshop for Chairs of Mathematical Sciences Departments” several times. Ostebee was the co-author of several calculus books with his colleague and former MAA President Paul Zorn. Learn more about his life from this page at St. Olaf’s, and his obituary.

Leigh Allan Fiedler passed away on September 20, 2015, at the age of 85. He was a mathematics professor at Black Hawk College (Illinois) and a member of the MAA for 52 years. More information about his life and career can be found in his obituary.

John William Scott “Ian” Cassels passed away on July 27, 2015, at the age of 93. Cassels was elected a Fellow of Trinity (Cambridge) in 1949, and was Sadleirian Professor of Pure Mathematics there. Cassels is best known for his seminal work in the theory of numbers. More information about his life can be found on his Wikipedia page and on this page. There is also a nice anecdote about Cassels in this article on John Conway, as well as a picture of Cassels in the MAA’s Paul Halmos “Who’s That Mathematician?” archive.

Norma P. Schmid passed away on July 6, 2015, at the age of 80. Schmid was a high school mathematics teacher in California before she retired, and she was a member of the MAA since 1956. Schmid was a generous donor to a number of organizations, including the MAA.

Louis Howard passed away on June 28, 2015, at the age of 86. He was emeritus professor of mathematics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a member of the MAA for 66 years. Howard was also professor emeritus at Florida State University where he worked for 15 years before his retirement. Howard was an applied mathematician with primary interests in fluid dynamics. Among his awards for his research, he received with the prestigious Fluid Dynamics Prize of the American Physical Society in 1997. More information about Howard’s life and career can be found in an article from MIT News.

Donald F. Young passed away on June 25, 2015, at the age of 70. He was Professor Emeritus at Southern Polytechnic State University (now consolidated with Kennesaw State University) and a member of the MAA since 1974. His obituary can be found here.

Lynn Arthur Steen passed away on June 21, 2015, at the age of 74. He was a professor at St. Olaf College until his retirement in 2009, and a member of the MAA since 1961. Steen was known for making mathematics more accessible to mathematics students and to people in other fields, and he was the lead writer for the 2004 MAA report "Achieving Quantitative Literacy: An Urgent Challenge for Higher Education". Steen was a leader in the MAA, serving as MAA President in 1985-86, as Editor of Mathematics Magazine from 1976 to 1980, and as an active member of several committees. He received the MAA’s Gung and Hu Award for Distinguished Service in 1992. In addition, he chaired the Conference Board for the Mathematical Sciences from 1988-1990, and led the writing of the important 1989 National Research Council report, "Everybody Counts: A Report to the Nation on the Future of Mathematics Education." Steen and his wife were inducted into the MAA’s Icosahedron Society in 2015. For more information about Steen’s life and career, see this remembrance at St. Olaf, St. Olaf’s compendium of highlights from his career, this MAA page, his Wikipedia page, and his obituary.

Norman Grossman passed away on May 29, 2015, at the age of 92. He was a member of the MAA for 59 years. At his retirement, Grossman was the chairman and CEO of the Fairchild-Republic Company on Long Island (now a part of Northrop Grumman). This is a company focused on the design and production of military aircraft such as the A-10 jet. More information about his life and career can be found in this remembrance from the Courant Institute (see page 8) and his obituary.

John Forbes Nash, Jr. and his wife Alicia were killed in a traffic accident in New Jersey on May 23, 2015. Nash, a Senior Research Mathematician at Princeton University, made seminal contributions in game theory, differential geometry, and partial differential equations. Nash won the Nobel Prize in 1994 for his work in game theory. Nash was also awarded the John von Neumann Theory Prize for his discovery of what is now called “Nash Equilibria”, as well as the Steele Prize, and the Abel Prize. He is well-known in the world due to the biographical film A Beautiful Mind, which was released in 2001. To learn more about Nash’s life and career, start with his Wikipedia page and this obituary in The New York Times. Also, Nash and his work are featured on many MAA pages.

Kiran Babu Chilakamarri passed away on April 25, 2015, at the age of 62. He was a professor at Texas Southern University and a member of the MAA since 2014. He specialized in graph theory, although his research applications spanned many mathematics and scientific domains. He earned two PhDs and authored over 30 papers, many in collaboration.

Susan Callahan passed away on April 20, 2015. She was a professor at Cottey College (Missouri) and a member of the MAA since 1978. She received the Missouri Governor's Award for Excellence in Teaching in 2002. Callahan was Governor of the Missouri Section of the MAA at the time of her death, and also a member of the Committee on Sessions of Contributed Papers. Many students commented on her passing on Facebook, and information about her life and career can be found in her obituary.

Toma (Thomas) Tonev passed away on February 22, 2015. He was a professor at the University of Montana and a member of the MAA. Tonev’s research interests were in functional analysis, complex analysis, and function algebras. Learn more about Tonev from his obituary and see this photograph from the University of Montana. In addition, see the Spring 2015 Montana newsletter on this page for two articles about Tonev’s life and career.

Issac Edward Block passed away on February 18, 2015, at the age of 90. Block was a founder and longtime managing director of the Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics (SIAM) until his retirement in 1994, and a member of the MAA from 1952 until 2000. An extensive discussion of his career and his substantial contributions to SIAM can be found on the SIAM web site. His obituary is here.

Mika Seppälä passed away suddenly on January 23, 2015, at the age of 63. He was a professor at Florida State University and a member of the MAA since 1999. Seppälä was known for his work in online education, including connections to the MAA’s WebWork project. More about his life and career can be found in his obituary.

Virginia Halmos passed away on January 19, 2015, at the age of 99. Virginia was a long-time MAA benefactor and a widow of the prominent mathematician and former editor of the American Mathematical Monthly Paul Halmos. Read more about her life and career. Paul and Virginia Halmos were inducted into the MAA’s Icosahedron Society in 2003.

Donald W. Kahn passed away on January 16, 2015, at the age of 79. He was a professor emeritus at the University of Minnesota. Kahn was known for his contributions to algebraic topology, authoring several books such as Topology: An Introduction to the Point-Set and Algebraic Areas. He also served as a state representative for 40 years, and was recognized as a talented musician, photographer, and raconteur. His obituary can be found here.