Page 622 - Probability and Statistical Inference

14. Appendix 599

W. Feller: William Feller was born on July 7, 1906, in Zagreb, Yugoslavia
(now Croatia). After finishing Masters degree there in 1925, he worked in the
University of Göttingen during 1925-1928 where he received Ph.D. degree in
1926 at a tender age of twenty. Feller knew David Hilbert and Richard Cou-
rant from Göttingen. He spent 1934-1939 at the University of Stockholm
where he came to know Harald Cramér.
In 1939, Feller joined Brown University at Providence as an associate pro-
fessor. He became the first Executive Editor of Mathematical Reviews and
continuously gave extraordinary service to the profession for six long years in
that position. In 1944, Feller became a U.S. citizen. Then, he moved to Cornell
University and finally in 1950, he joined Princeton University as the presti-
gious Eugene Huggins Professor.
Feller’s research covered many areas including calculus, geometry, func-
tional analysis, and probability theory. He was keenly interested in mathemati-
cal genetics. Some of his best known papers in probability theory made fun-
damental contributions in and around the classical limit theorems. These in-
cluded the Central Limit Theorem, the Law of the Iterated Logarithm, and the
Renewal Theory. Feller’s versatility as a first-rate mathematician was recog-
nized and highly respected by eminent mathematicians including F. Hausdorff,
A. N. Kolmogorov, G. H. Hardy, J. E. Littlewood, A. Y. Khinchine, P. Lévy
and P. Erdös. During 1950-1962, Feller went on to break new grounds on the
theory of diffusion which was earlier developed by Kolmogorov.
Feller’s seminal works, An Introduction to Probability Theory and Its Ap-
plications, Volume 1 (1950; third edition 1968) and Volume 2 (1956; second
edition in 1971), both published by Wiley, are still regarded as classics in
probability theory.
Feller received many honors. He was a member of the U.S. National Acad-
emy of Sciences, a past Governor of Mathematical Association of America,
and President (1946) of the Institute of Mathematical Statistics.
Feller was to receive the U.S. National Medal of Science, the highest honor
an American scientist can receive, in a White House ceremony on February
16, 1970. But the world of mathematics was stunned in grief to learn that
William Feller passed away on January 14, 1970, in New York.
By action of the Council of the Institute of Mathematical Statistics, the
1970 volume of the Annals of Mathematical Statistics was dedicated to the
memory of William Feller. Its opening article “William Feller 1906-1970” pre-
pared by the Editors of the Annals of Mathematical Statistics, described the
life and career of this one of a kind giant among mathematicians.
R. A. Fisher: Ronald Aylmer Fisher was born on February 17, 1890
in North London. When he was six years old, Fisher studied astronomy