Yale Bulletin and Calendar

December 13, 1999-January 17, 2000

Volume 28, Number 16

Nathan Jacobson

Nathan Jacobson, noted for work
in abstract algebra, dies

Nathan Jacobson, the Henry Ford II Professor Emeritus of Mathematics, died on Dec. 5, at age 89.

Professor Jacobson's name is associated with numerous concepts and theorems in abstract algebra that have come to influence the thinking of mathematicians in diverse fields. These include the notions of the "Jacobson radical" and the "Jacobson topology" in ring theory -- ideas that enabled the systems called rings to be investigated, free of the conditions limiting earlier researchers.

Known as "Jake" to the mathematical community, the Yale professor was the author of 17 books, the first appearing in 1943 and the last in 1996. His three-volume set, "Lectures in Abstract Algebra," and its successors, "Basic Algebra I and II," served as comprehensive and challenging expositions of the subject to several generations of students. Professor Jacobson directed the research of some 30 doctoral students, many of whom have gone on to positions of leadership in American mathematics.

Professor Jacobson was a member of the National Academy of Sciences and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, as well as an honorary member of the London Mathematical Society. He was honored by several institutions of higher learning, including the University of Chicago, which awarded him an honorary doctorate in 1972, and the University of Alabama, which designated him as Sesquicentennial Honorary Professor in 1981. The Yale scholar received the Leroy P. Steele Prize for Lifetime Achievement from the American Mathematical Society in 1998.

He was president of the American Mathematical Society from 1971 to 1973, and one of two vice-presidents of the International Mathematical Union from 1972 to 1974. The other vice-president at the time was L.S. Pontrjagin of the U.S.S.R. Jacobson frequently clashed with his fellow vice president over the Soviet Union's refusal to permit invited speakers, most of whom were Jewish, to accept the group's invitations to speak or attend events. Resolution of the conflict came only with significant changes in the Soviet hierarchy.

Nathan Jacobson was born in Warsaw, Poland in 1910 and immigrated to the United States with his family at the age of 8. He grew up in Mississippi and Alabama, graduating from the University of Alabama in 1930. He received his Ph.D. in mathematics from Princeton University in 1934. He taught at Bryn Mawr College, the University of North Carolina and the Johns Hopkins University before joining the Yale faculty in 1947. He was promoted to full professor in 1949 and was named Henry Ford II Professor in 1963. He retired in 1981.

A resident of Hamden, Connecticut, Professor Jacobson was predeceased by his wife of 54 years, the late Florence Dorfman Jacobson, who passed away in 1996. He is survived by a son, Michael Jacobson, of Norwalk, Conn., and by a daughter, Pauline Jacobson of Providence, Rhode Island, along with one granddaughter and three great-grandchildren.

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