Erich Leo Lehmann (20 November 1917 – 12 September 2009) was a German-born American

statistician A statistician is a person who works with theoretical or applied statistics. The profession exists in both the private and public sectors. It is common to combine statistical knowledge with expertise in other subjects, and statisticians may wor ...

, who made a major contribution to

nonparametric Nonparametric statistics is the branch of statistics that is not based solely on parametrized families of probability distributions (common examples of parameters are the mean and variance). Nonparametric statistics is based on either being dist ...

hypothesis testing A statistical hypothesis test is a method of statistical inference used to decide whether the data at hand sufficiently support a particular hypothesis. Hypothesis testing allows us to make probabilistic statements about population parameters. ...

. He is one of the

eponym An eponym is a person, a place, or a thing after whom or which someone or something is, or is believed to be, named. The adjectives which are derived from the word eponym include ''eponymous'' and ''eponymic''. Usage of the word The term ''epon ...

s of the

Lehmann–Scheffé theorem In statistics, the Lehmann–Scheffé theorem is a prominent statement, tying together the ideas of completeness, sufficiency, uniqueness, and best unbiased estimation. The theorem states that any estimator which is unbiased for a given unknown qu ...

and of the

Hodges–Lehmann estimator In statistics, the Hodges–Lehmann estimator is a robust and nonparametric estimator of a population's location parameter. For populations that are symmetric about one median, such as the (Gaussian) normal distribution or the Student ''t''-distri ...

of the

median In statistics and probability theory, the median is the value separating the higher half from the lower half of a data sample, a population, or a probability distribution. For a data set, it may be thought of as "the middle" value. The basic fe ...

of a population.

Early life

Lehmann was born in

Strasbourg Strasbourg (, , ; german: Straßburg ; gsw, label=Bas Rhin Alsatian, Strossburi , gsw, label=Haut Rhin Alsatian, Strossburig ) is the prefecture and largest city of the Grand Est region of eastern France and the official seat of the Eu ...

, Alsace-Lorraine in 1917 to a family of

Ashkenazi Jewish Ashkenazi Jews ( ; he, יְהוּדֵי אַשְׁכְּנַז, translit=Yehudei Ashkenaz, ; yi, אַשכּנזישע ייִדן, Ashkenazishe Yidn), also known as Ashkenazic Jews or ''Ashkenazim'',, Ashkenazi Hebrew pronunciation: , singu ...

ancestry. He grew up in

Frankfurt am Main Frankfurt, officially Frankfurt am Main (; Hessian: , "Frank ford on the Main"), is the most populous city in the German state of Hesse. Its 791,000 inhabitants as of 2022 make it the fifth-most populous city in Germany. Located on its na ...

, Germany, until the

Machtergreifung Adolf Hitler's rise to power began in the newly established Weimar Republic in September 1919 when Hitler joined the '' Deutsche Arbeiterpartei'' (DAP; German Workers' Party). He rose to a place of prominence in the early years of the party. Be ...

in 1933 his family fled to

Switzerland ). Swiss law does not designate a ''capital'' as such, but the federal parliament and government are installed in Bern, while other federal institutions, such as the federal courts, are in other cities (Bellinzona, Lausanne, Luzern, Neuchâtel ...

to escape the

Nazi Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in ...

s. He graduated from high school in Zurich, and studied mathematics for two years at

Trinity College, Cambridge Trinity College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Founded in 1546 by Henry VIII, King Henry VIII, Trinity is one of the largest Cambridge colleges, with the largest financial endowment of any college at either Cambridge ...

. Following that, he emigrated to the United States, arriving in New York in late 1940. He enrolled in

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant u ...

as a post-graduate student—albeit without a prior degree—in 1941.

Career

Lehmann obtained his MA in mathematics in 1942 and his PhD (under

Jerzy Neyman Jerzy Neyman (April 16, 1894 – August 5, 1981; born Jerzy Spława-Neyman; ) was a Polish mathematician and statistician who spent the first part of his professional career at various institutions in Warsaw, Poland and then at University College ...

) in 1946, at the

, where he taught from 1942. From August 1944 to August 1945 he worked as an operations analyst for the

United States Air Force The United States Air Force (USAF) is the air service branch of the United States Armed Forces, and is one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Originally created on 1 August 1907, as a part of the United States Army Signal ...

Guam Guam (; ch, Guåhan ) is an organized, unincorporated territory of the United States in the Micronesia subregion of the western Pacific Ocean. It is the westernmost point and territory of the United States (reckoned from the geographic cent ...

. He taught at

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...

and at

Princeton University Princeton University is a private university, private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth, New Jersey, Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the List of Colonial Colleges, fourth-oldest ins ...

during 1950–51, and then during 1951–1952 he was a visiting associate professor at

Stanford University Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is consider ...

. He was an editor of "The Annals of Mathematical Statistics" and president of the

Institute of Mathematical Statistics The Institute of Mathematical Statistics is an international professional and scholarly society devoted to the development, dissemination, and application of statistics and probability. The Institute currently has about 4,000 members in all parts o ...

, and a member of the

American Academy of Arts and Sciences The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (abbreviation: AAA&S) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, and ...

and the

National Academy of Sciences The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, non-governmental organization. NAS is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the Nati ...

. In 1977 he married another statistician,

Juliet Popper Shaffer Juliet Popper Shaffer (born May 23, 1932) is an American psychologist, statistician and statistics education, statistics educator known for her research on Multiple comparisons problem, multiple hypothesis testing. She is a teaching professor emer ...

, whom he had met four years earlier as the sponsor to her sabbatical visit to Berkeley. In the same year, Shaffer moved from being a psychology professor at the

University of Kansas The University of Kansas (KU) is a public research university with its main campus in Lawrence, Kansas, United States, and several satellite campuses, research and educational centers, medical centers, and classes across the state of Kansas. Tw ...

to a lecturer position in statistics at Berkeley. In 1997, on the occasion of his eightieth birthday, the department of statistics at the

University of California at Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant univ ...

created the Erich Lehmann Fund in StatisticsErich Lehmann Fund in Statistics
/ref> to support the students of the department.

Selected publications

Books

* ''Testing Statistical Hypotheses'', 1959 * ''Basic Concepts of Probability and Statistics'', 1964, co-author J. L. Hodges * ''Elements of Finite Probability'', 1965, co-author J. L. Hodges * * ''Theory of Point Estimation'', 1983 *
''Reminiscences of a Statistician''
2007, * ''Fisher, Neyman, and the Creation of Classical Statistics'', 2011, ublished posthumously

Articles

* * * *

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Lehmann, Erich Leo 1917 births 2009 deaths University of California, Berkeley alumni University of California, Berkeley faculty American statisticians Fellows of the American Statistical Association Presidents of the Institute of Mathematical Statistics Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences Mathematical statisticians