Harry Pollard (28 February 1919 – November 20, 1985). was an American mathematician. He received his Ph.D from

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...

in 1942 under the supervision of

David Widder David Vernon Widder (25 March 1898 – 8 July 1990) was an American mathematician. He earned his Ph.D. at Harvard University in 1924 under George Birkhoff and went on to join the faculty there. He was a co-founder of the ''Duke Mathematical Jour ...

. He then taught at

Cornell University Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to teach an ...

, and was Professor of Mathematics at

Purdue University Purdue University is a public land-grant research university in West Lafayette, Indiana, and the flagship campus of the Purdue University system. The university was founded in 1869 after Lafayette businessman John Purdue donated land and money ...

from 1961 until his death in 1985. He is known for his work on

celestial mechanics Celestial mechanics is the branch of astronomy that deals with the motions of objects in outer space. Historically, celestial mechanics applies principles of physics (classical mechanics) to astronomical objects, such as stars and planets, to ...

orthogonal polynomials In mathematics, an orthogonal polynomial sequence is a family of polynomials such that any two different polynomials in the sequence are orthogonal to each other under some inner product. The most widely used orthogonal polynomials are the class ...

and the

n-body problem In physics, the -body problem is the problem of predicting the individual motions of a group of celestial objects interacting with each other gravitationally.Leimanis and Minorsky: Our interest is with Leimanis, who first discusses some histor ...

as well as for the several textbooks he authored or co-authored. In the theory of Orthogonal polynomials, Pollard solved a conjecture of

Antoni Zygmund Antoni Zygmund (December 25, 1900 – May 30, 1992) was a Polish mathematician. He worked mostly in the area of mathematical analysis, including especially harmonic analysis, and he is considered one of the greatest analysts of the 20th century. ...

, establishing mean convergence of the partial sums in

L^p

norms for the

Legendre polynomials In physical science and mathematics, Legendre polynomials (named after Adrien-Marie Legendre, who discovered them in 1782) are a system of complete and orthogonal polynomials, with a vast number of mathematical properties, and numerous applica ...

and

Jacobi polynomials In mathematics, Jacobi polynomials (occasionally called hypergeometric polynomials) P_n^(x) are a class of classical orthogonal polynomials. They are orthogonal with respect to the weight (1-x)^\alpha(1+x)^\beta on the interval 1,1/math>. The ...

in a series of three papers in the Transactions of the American Mathematical Society. The first of these papers deals with the fundamental case of

. The end point cases in Pollard's theorem was established by Sagun Chanillo.

Books

*. Originally published 1950.Review of ''The Theory of Algebraic Numbers'' by Mordan Ward (1951), ''Math. Mag.'' 25 (2): 105, . 3rd edition, 1998 Dover reprint. *.Review of ''Applied Mathematics: An Introduction'' by N. D. Kazarinoff (1973), ''Math. Mag.'' 46 (3): 164–165, . * *.

References

1919 births 1985 deaths 20th-century American mathematicians Harvard Graduate School of Arts and Sciences alumni American textbook writers Cornell University faculty Purdue University faculty {{US-mathematician-stub