Topology Atlas Document # topc-88 | Production Editor: Thomas M. Zachariah

TOPOLOGICAL COMMENTARY

Volume 5, February 10, 2000

Edited by Melvin Henriksen

commentary@mail.mathatlas.yorku.ca

I continue to invite commentary on any article in any issue of TopCom or on any topic of general interest to topologists, including news about topologists or topological activity.

A New Format for TopCom

Starting from this issue, we will post items in Topological Commentary as they arrive. When enough items have been posted in any year, a new issue will be started.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

  1. More News About John Isbell
  2. F. B. Jones in Memorium
  3. More on Felix Hausdorff
  4. An Interview of Edwin Moise
  5. The Math Forum
  6. Photos of Russian Mathematicians
  7. Arthur Stone (1916-2000)
  8. Photos from Topo 2000
  9. Memorials for John L. Kelley (1917-1999)
  10. Book Review
  11. Ben Fitzpatrick (1932-2000)

1. More News About John Isbell

An update about John Isbell posted on February 10, 2000, by Scott Williams. More News About John Isbell.

2. F. B. Jones in Memorium

All of us who knew him regret his death and the loss he creates by no longer being part of the topological community. He was an early student of R.L. Moore, a great teacher whose students made substantial contributions to topology, and a research mathematician of great talent. This memorial is in three parts.
  1. A memorial by one of his more able students, Professor James Rogers of Tulane University that includes a photograph. This will appear also in Topology Proceedings. F. Burton Jones (1910 - 1999) - An Appreciation.

    We are indebted to the Kluwer Academic Publishers for giving us permission to reproduce the following articles from Volume I of their Handbook of the History of General Topology edited by C. E. Aull and R. Louwen.

  2. The Early Work of F.B. Jones by Mary Ellen Rudin. This article is reproduced from the Handbook of the History of General Topology, Volume 1, pp 85-96. The Early Work of F.B. Jones

  3. The Beginning of Topology in the United States and the Moore School by F.B. Jones. This article is reproduced from the Handbook of the History of General Topology, Volume 1, pp 97-103. The Beginning of Topology in the United States and the Moore School.

3. More on Felix Hausdorff

In Volume 3 #1 of TopCom, the catalog of the forthcoming Nachlass was posted. It is a very lengthy document written in German. In Volume I of their Handbook of the History of General Topology edited by C. E. Aull and R. Louwen (see item 2. above), there is on pp. 3-19, an expository article by Gerhard Preuss written in English that describes the life and contributions of Hausdorff to mathematics and philosophy far more succinctly. This editor recommends it highly.

4. An Interview of Edwin Moise

What follows is an interview of the eminent topologist Edwin Moise (1919-1998) conducted by Richard Anderson and Ben Fitzpatick. Edwin Moise, a student of R.L. Moore, made many substantial contributions to topology, perhaps the most famous one being his triangulation of three manifolds. He was also an active member of the School Mathematics Study Group in the 1950s and 1960s that aimed to reform substantially the way that mathematics was taught in the United States. Among other things, he wrote text material on high school geometry making use of the Hilbert separation axioms. His work for SMSG earned great praise from some quarters and severe criticism from others.

He suffered from a stroke in his later years and this interview was conducted in his apartment in New York City. It is also a part of the:

R. L. Moore Biography Project
The Center for American History
The University of Texas at Austin
The late Gail Young was also involved. We are indebted to to Richard Anderson and Ben Fitzpatrick for permission to reproduce this interview.

5. The Math Forum

The Math Forum (URL: http://www.mathforum.com) is a gigantic mathematical net work whose history is described in the press release posted below.

It contains material ranging from elementary to research level mathematics, including mathematics education, the history of mathematics, a nunber of other networks including Topology Atlas and the one concerned with category theory. It is difficult to think of a branch of mathematics, pure or applied, about which there is no coverage. Readers may also ask questions about mathematical topics and get information about books.

I recommend it highly with one caveat. Finding items is often not very easy, but the seach is usually worth the struggle. Exercise: Find Topology Atlas. Hint: Do not start by looking under Topology.

See the press release from The Chronicle of Higher Education.

6. Photos of Russian Mathematicians

An updated version of the home page of Douglas Cameron containing more photos of Russian mathematicians can be found at http://gozips.uakron.edu/~decamer/. The earlier version of his homepage contains an explanation of how these photos were obtained. Its url is: http://at.yorku.ca/t/o/p/c/41.htm. This latter also contains a link to the MacTutor of History, which is a large network devoted to the history of mathematics.

7. Arthur Stone (1916-2000)

Arthur Stone, famous for his many contributions of high quality to general topology and to mathematics in general, passed away on August 6, 2000. He was the subject of an interview in Volume 2 #1 of Topological Commentary http://at.yorku.ca/t/o/p/c/16.htm. Stone's extreme modesty resulted, regrettably, in an understatement of his many honors and accomplishments. He is survived by his wife Dorothy Maharam Stone. We hope to publish a memorial for this great mathematician at a later date.

8. Photos from Topo 2000

The Summer Topology Conference (Topo 2000) was held at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio July 26-29. Jerry Vaughan was kind enough to forward a substantial number of photographs of participants at this conference which are posted below. Photos from Topo 2000.

9. Memorials for John L. Kelley (1917-1999)

  1. John L. Kelley - announcement of his death: Volume 4, Issues 2, Item 9.
  2. John L. Kelley - UC Berkeley News Release
  3. Once over lightly is an autobiographical article written by Kelley in 1987. An "Oakie", he was brought by his parents to California in 1930. It includes a fascinating description through his eyes of what it was like to be mathematician beginning in the late 1930s. It is reproduced from "A Century of Mathematics in America" Volume 3, pp. 471-493 with permision of the American Mathematical Society.
  4. John L. Kelley - Kelley - One student's rememberance by Isaac Namioka.

10. Book Review by Krzysztof Ciesielski

This is a review of the book Strange Functions in Real Analysis, by A. B. Kharazishvili. As the title suggests, the subject of this book is concentrated around different strange (or singular) objects, mainly functions, which appear in real analysis in different contexts.

11. Ben Fitzpatrick September 1932-November 2000

The distinguished topologist, Ben Fitzpatrick, passed away on November 11, 2000. He was a student of R.L. Moore, made many contributions to the topological literature, and spent most of his career at Auburn University. He retired in 1994, moved to San Antonio Texas, taught at the College of the Immaculate Word, and then returned to Auburn. He was much admired as a teacher, was chairman of the mathematics department for a number of years, and directed many PhD dissertations, including those of Judy Kennedy and Mike Reed.

A web site has been established with information, memorabilia, and a caricature of Ben. Its url is: http://www.benfitzpatrick.net

Some autobiographical material may be found at the url: http://www.auburn.edu/~fitzpbe/docs/bio_bf.html. More material will be added to this site at a later date.

Copyright © 1995-2000 by Topology Atlas. All rights reserved.