Albert "Tommy" Wilansky (13 September 1921,

St Johns, Newfoundland St. John's is the capital and largest city of the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador, located on the eastern tip of the Avalon Peninsula on the island of Newfoundland. The city spans and is the easternmost city in North America ...

– 3 July 2017,

Bethlehem, Pennsylvania Bethlehem is a city in Northampton and Lehigh Counties in the Lehigh Valley region of eastern Pennsylvania, United States. As of the 2020 census, Bethlehem had a total population of 75,781. Of this, 55,639 were in Northampton County and 19, ...

) was a Canadian-American mathematician, known for introducing

Smith number In number theory, a Smith number is a composite number for which, in a given number base, the sum of its digits is equal to the sum of the digits in its prime factorization in the given number base. In the case of numbers that are not square-free ...

Biography

Wilansky was educated as an undergraduate at

Dalhousie University Dalhousie University (commonly known as Dal) is a large public research university in Nova Scotia Nova Scotia ( ; ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is one of the three Maritime provinces and one of the fou ...

, where he received an M.A. in mathematics in 1944. From 1944 to 1947 he was a graduate student at Brown University. (See personal profile of Albert Wilansky in Chapter 6.) In 1947 he received his Ph.D. with advisor Clarence Raymond Adams and dissertation ''An application of Banach linear functionals to the theory of summability''. From 1948 until his official retirement in 1992, Wilansky was a faculty member of the mathematics department of

Lehigh University Lehigh University (LU) is a private research university in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania in the Lehigh Valley region of eastern Pennsylvania. The university was established in 1865 by businessman Asa Packer and was originally affiliated with the Epis ...

. Wilansky did research in analysis, specializing in summability theory, linear topological spaces, Banach algebras, and functional analysis. He was the author of several books and the author or co-author of more than 80 articles. He lectured at over 50 different universities. In 1969 he received the

Mathematical Association of America The Mathematical Association of America (MAA) is a professional society that focuses on mathematics accessible at the undergraduate level. Members include university, college, and high school teachers; graduate and undergraduate students; pure a ...

Lester R. Ford Award Lester is an ancient Anglo-Saxon surname and given name. Notable people and characters with the name include: People Given name * Lester Bangs (1948–1982), American music critic * Lester W. Bentley (1908–1972), American artist from Wisc ...

for his 1968 article ''Spectral Decomposition of Matrices for High School Students''. (The 1969 award was also given individually to 5 other mathematicians.) Wilansky was married to his first wife from 1947 until her death in 1969. They had two daughters. He had three step-daughters from his second marriage.

Selected publications

Articles

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Books

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References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Wilansky, Albert 1921 births 2017 deaths 20th-century American mathematicians 21st-century American mathematicians Functional analysts Mathematical analysts Dalhousie University alumni Brown University alumni Lehigh University faculty Canadian emigrants to the United States