Sanford Segal Retires

After 44 years at the University of Rochester, Sanford Segal, Professor of Mathematics, will retire on June 30th, 2008. Sandy received his B.A. from Wesleyan University in 1958 with Honors in Mathematics and High Honors in Classical Civilization. He became a member of Sigma Xi then, and of Phi Beta Kappa the preceding year. After his B.A. he spent a year as a Fulbright Student in Mainz, Germany. On his return Sandy spent a couple of years in Chicago, then moved to Colorado where he got his Ph.D. under the direction of Sarvadaman Chowla. He came to the University of Rochester as an instructor in 1963. He received a Fulbright Grant as a research fellow for 1965-66 in Vienna, Austria. He advanced to Assistant Professor in 1965 and received tenure in 1970. In 1972-73 he had another sabbatical in Nottingham, England. In 1982 he pulished "Nine Introductions in Complex Analysis" with Elsvier Publishing. This book had a second edition in 2007. Also in 1982, Sandy received a grant from IMPA in Brazil and spent the summer (their winter) in Rio de Janeiro. In 1977 he became Professor, and was chair of the department from 1979 to 1987.

Sandy has always been interested in history and, when his chairmanship ended, he received a grant from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation to do reseach on the mathematicians who stayed in Germany when Hitler came to power. This began the research that eventually led to his book "Mathematicians Under the Nazis", published by Princeton in 2003. This publication is a social history, with no mathematics in it. He has another book coming out this year, a translation from the French, called "History of Mathematics: Highways and Byways".

Sandy has taught many courses in the history of science over the years by arrangement with the History Department. Sometimes these were courses for freshmen, often to upperclassmen. He also developed a "Women's Studies" version of his history of science course. In 2003, he received a secondary appointment in History.

In 1985 Sandy was selected for a summer program at Harvard on nuclear arms and arms control. Based on what he learned in that course and on extensive additional reading, he taught a course on nuclear arms several times in the Political Science Department.

Sandy enjoys playing chess and gardening. He is still interested in several mathematics problems, but the past ten years have seen his interest in the history of science and the pedagogy of mathematics at all levels increase. For example, for the past five years he has been a member of Judith Fonzi's group in the Warner School.

As you can see, Sandy Segal has an extraordinarily wide range of scholarly interests. Although he will no longer be teaching classes, we expect he will continue to put in long days at the department. We know all will join us in congratulating Sandy on his retirement.