Joseph Steven Madachy (March 16, 1927 – March 27, 2014) was a research chemist, technical editor and recreational mathematician. He was the lead editor of '' Journal of Recreational Mathematics'' for nearly 30 years and then served as editor emeritus. He was owner, publisher and editor of its predecessor, ''Recreational Mathematics Magazine,'' which appeared from 1961–1964.

Early life and education

Madachy was born in Star Junction, Pennsylvania, to Steven and Anne Madachy. He was raised in Cleveland, Ohio. He became interested in recreational mathematics after reading Eugene Northrop's 1944 book, ''Riddles in Mathematics''. After service in World War II, he attended

Western Reserve University Western may refer to: Places *Western, Nebraska, a village in the US *Western, New York, a town in the US * Western Creek, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western Junction, Tasmania, a locality in Australia *Western world, countries that i ...

on the

G.I. Bill The Servicemen's Readjustment Act of 1944, commonly known as the G.I. Bill, was a law that provided a range of benefits for some of the returning World War II veterans (commonly referred to as G.I.s). The original G.I. Bill expired in 1956, bu ...

and earned a bachelor's and a master's in Chemistry.

Career

Madachy moved to

Dayton Dayton () is the sixth-largest city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Montgomery County. A small part of the city extends into Greene County. The 2020 U.S. census estimate put the city population at 137,644, while Greater Da ...

, Ohio, and worked for

Mound Laboratories Mound Laboratory in Miamisburg, Ohio was an Atomic Energy Commission (later Department of Energy) facility for nuclear weapon research during the Cold War, named after the nearby Miamisburg Indian Mound. The laboratory grew out of the World Wa ...

. He made original contributions to the field of recreational mathematics. In 1960 he wrote to recreational mathematician

Martin Gardner Martin Gardner (October 21, 1914May 22, 2010) was an American popular mathematics and popular science writer with interests also encompassing scientific skepticism, micromagic, philosophy, religion, and literatureespecially the writings of Lew ...

, asking whether Gardner knew of any publications devoted solely to recreational mathematics, as he was considering starting such a project. Gardner responded in the negative, including a box containing his correspondence and suggesting Madachy could use the addresses to promote the magazine. From February 1961 to 1964 Madachy published the bimonthly ''Recreational Mathematics Magazine''. Joseph Madachy - Mathematics on Vacation

Joseph Madachy - Mathematics on Vacation

In 1967, Greenwood Press asked him to start the journal again under the title ''Journal of Recreational Mathematics,'' which was published by Baywood Publishing starting in 1973. He authored several books on recreational mathematics, including ''Mathematics on Vacation'' (1966), ''Madachy's Mathematical Recreations'' and ''Mathematical Diversions.'' He served as the literary agent for

Dmitri Borgmann Dmitri Alfred Borgmann (October 22, 1927 – December 7, 1985) was a German-American author best known for his work in recreational linguistics. Early life Borgmann was born on October 22, 1927, in Berlin, Germany, to Hans and Lisa Borgmann. Fe ...

's ''

Language on Vacation ''Language on Vacation: An Olio of Orthographical Oddities'' is a 1965 book written by Dmitri Borgmann. Content Borgmann introduces his book by stating that he hopes it will "elevate recreational linguistics to the same high level of esteem now ...

''. Longtime colleagues and co-authors include

, Harry L. Nelson, and Isaac Asimov, and Solomon Golomb (with pentominos). He worked with

polyomino A polyomino is a plane geometric figure formed by joining one or more equal squares edge to edge. It is a polyform whose cells are squares. It may be regarded as a finite subset of the regular square tiling. Polyominoes have been used in pop ...

es, pentominos,"Pentominos - Some Solved and Unsolved Problems",

prime number A prime number (or a prime) is a natural number greater than 1 that is not a product of two smaller natural numbers. A natural number greater than 1 that is not prime is called a composite number. For example, 5 is prime because the only ways ...

s, and

amicable numbers Amicable numbers are two different natural numbers related in such a way that the sum of the proper divisors of each is equal to the other number. That is, σ(''a'')=''b'' and σ(''b'')=''a'', where σ(''n'') is equal to the sum of positive di ...

. He worked developing mathematical concepts such as cryptarithmetic, used in cyber security applications. He made contributions to Fibonacci series and

narcissistic number In number theory, a narcissistic number 1 F_ : \mathbb \rightarrow \mathbb to be the following: : F_(n) = \sum_^ d_i^k. where k = \lfloor \log_ \rfloor + 1 is the number of digits in the number in base b, and : d_i = \frac is the value of each d ...

s"Some New Narcissistic Numbers", and devised puzzles using

Fibonacci number In mathematics, the Fibonacci numbers, commonly denoted , form a sequence, the Fibonacci sequence, in which each number is the sum of the two preceding ones. The sequence commonly starts from 0 and 1, although some authors start the sequence from ...

s. His recreational mathematics work included areas in chess, magic squares and calculator art."Calculator Art Contest", Journal of Recreational Mathematics, Baywood Publishing. July 1971 Madachy retired from editing ''Journal of Recreational Mathematics'' in 2000. Pentomino Puzzle Solutions

In popular culture

Madachy is mentioned in the

Jack Reacher Jack Reacher is the protagonist of a series of crime thriller novels by British author Lee Child. In the stories, Jack Reacher was a major in the US Army's military police. Having left the Army at age 36, Reacher roams the United States, tak ...

novel series in the book '' Never Go Back,'' which uses perfect digit-to-digit invariant numbers in the plot: "Such numbers had been much discussed by a guy called Joseph Madachy, who once upon a time had been the owner, publisher, and editor of a magazine called Journal of Recreational Mathematics."

Personal life

Madachy and his wife, Juliana, lived in Dayton, Ohio and had six children.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Madachy, Joseph 1927 births 20th-century American mathematicians 21st-century American mathematicians Recreational mathematicians People from Pennsylvania 2014 deaths