David George Kendall

For other people of the same name, see David Kendall (disambiguation).

David George Kendall
Born	15 January 1918(1918-01-15) Ripon, North Riding of Yorkshire, England
Died	23 October 2007(2007-10-23) (aged 89) Cambridge
Nationality	British
Fields	Probability, statistics, statistical shape analysis
Institutions	Magdalen College, Oxford Churchill College, Cambridge
Doctoral advisor	M. S. Bartlett[1]
Doctoral students	William Waugh, Adrian Baddeley, Andrew Barbour, Rollo Davidson, David Edwards, David Williams, Daryl Daley, David Vere-Jones, John Kingman, Nick Bingham, Richard Tweedie, Denis Mollison, Bernard Silverman, Christopher Small[1]
Notable awards	Fellow of the Royal Society[2], Guy Medal

David George Kendall FRS^[2] (15 January 1918 – 23 October 2007)^[3] was an English statistician, who spent much of his academic life in the University of Oxford and the University of Cambridge. He worked with M. S. Bartlett during the war, and visited Princeton University after the war.^[4]

Kendall was born in Ripon, North Riding of Yorkshire, and attended Ripon Grammar School before attending Queen's College, Oxford, graduating in 1939.^[5][6][2] He worked on rocketry during the war, before moving to Magdalen College, Oxford in 1946. He was appointed the first Professor of Mathematical Statistics in the Statistical Laboratory, University of Cambridge in 1962, in which post he remained until his retirement in 1985. He was elected to a professorial fellowship at Churchill College, and he was a founding trustee of the Rollo Davidson Trust.

Kendall was a world expert in probability and data analysis, and pioneered statistical shape analysis including the study of ley lines. He defined Kendall's notation for queueing theory.

The Royal Statistical Society awarded him the Guy Medal in Silver in 1955, followed in 1981 by the Guy Medal in Gold. In 1980 the London Mathematical Society awarded Kendall their Senior Whitehead Prize, and in 1989 their De Morgan Medal.^[7] He was elected a fellow of the Royal Society in 1964.

He was to married Diana Fletcher from 1952 until his death. They had two sons and four daughters, including Wilfrid Kendall, professor in the Department of Statistics at the University of Warwick and reporter Bridget Kendall MBE.^[3]

References

1. ^ ^{a b} David George Kendall at the Mathematics Genealogy Project.
2. ^ ^{a b c} Kingman, J. (2009). "David George Kendall. 15 January 1918 -- 23 October 2007". Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society 55: 121. doi:10.1098/rsbm.2008.0017.  edit
3. ^ ^{a b} Obituary in The Times, 21 November 2007
4. ^ O'Connor, John J.; Robertson, Edmund F., "David George Kendall", MacTutor History of Mathematics archive, University of St Andrews, http://www-history.mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/Biographies/Kendall.html .
5. ^ Grimmett, G. (2008), David George Kendall, arXiv:0810.1091 
6. ^ Bingham, N. H. (1996). "A conversation with David Kendall". Statistical Science 11 (3): 159. doi:10.1214/ss/1032280213.  edit
7. ^ London Mathematical Society, List of Prizewinners, http://www.lms.ac.uk/activities/prizes_com/pastwinners.html, retrieved 2007-07-08 

External links

• Janus: The Papers of Professor David Kendall
• Royal Society citation

Persondata
Name	Kendall, David George
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	1918-01-15
Place of birth	Ripon, North Riding of Yorkshire, England
Date of death	2007-10-23
Place of death	Cambridge