Read Bill Withers, Who Sang ‘Lean on Me’ and ‘Ain’t No Sunshine,’ Dies at 81 (nytimes.com)
A three-time Grammy Award winner, he had a string of much-covered hits in the 1970s but had not released an album since 1985.
This is depressing news. Withers is one of my favorite all time artists. It definitely isn’t a Lovely Day. There also Ain’t No Sunshine today.

I’ll pour one out for you today Bill. Thanks for leaving your music behind.

Read Playwright Terrence McNally Dies Of Complications Due To Coronavirus by Greg Evans (Deadline)
Acclaimed playwright Terrence McNally has died of complications due to coronavirus. The author of Master Class, Frankie and Johnny in the Clair de Lune and Love! Valour! Compassion!, among many oth…
Read Freeman Dyson, Math Genius Turned Technological Visionary, Dies at 96 (nytimes.com)
After an early breakthrough on light and matter, he became a writer who challenged climate science and pondered space exploration and nuclear warfare.
How did I miss this when it came out?

Bookmarked on March 21, 2020 at 02:39PM

Read Frederick Koch, Who Spurned Family Business, Dies at 86 by Katharine Q. Seelye (nytimes.com)
The oldest of four boys, he had little interest in his brothers’ conglomerate or politics. Instead, he collected art and restored manor houses.
I was coincidentally reading a bit about the Kochs last night in American Amnesia. They indicated that Koch’s father was a co-founder of the John Birch society and naturally the boys were all steeped in their philosophy.
Read From Judy Woodruff: Longtime PBS NewsHour Anchor and Co-Founder Jim Lehrer Has Passed Away at 85 (PBS NewsHour)
Washington, DC (January 23, 2020) -- It is with great sadness that I share the news that co-founder and longtime anchor of the PBS NewsHour Jim Lehrer died today, Thursday, January 23, 2020, peacefully in his sleep at home. Lehrer, born May 19, 1934, served as anchor of the NewsHour for 36 years before retiring in 2011. Lehrer and Robert MacNeil founded the program in 1975, out of their 1973 coverage of the Senate Watergate Hearings on PBS. "I'm
Bookmarked on January 23, 2020 at 06:52PM

👓 I.M. Pei, Master Architect Whose Buildings Dazzled the World, Dies at 102 | The New York Times

Read I.M. Pei, Master Architect Whose Buildings Dazzled the World, Dies at 102 (New York Times)
Mr. Pei, a committed modernist, was one of the few architects equally attractive to real estate developers, corporate chieftains and art museum boards.
I had the privilege of working in an I.M. Pei office building for about two years. It wasn’t a museum, but had so much modern art on its walls and Roy Lichtenstein’s massive “Bauhaus Stairway” in the lobby that it seemed like a museum.

angle on the lobby of the CAA building designed by IM Pei

👓 Solomon Golomb (1932–2016) | Stephen Wolfram

Read Solomon Golomb (1932–2016) by Stephen WolframStephen Wolfram (blog.stephenwolfram.com)

The Most-Used Mathematical Algorithm Idea in History

An octillion. A billion billion billion. That’s a fairly conservative estimate of the number of times a cellphone or other device somewhere in the world has generated a bit using a maximum-length linear-feedback shift register sequence. It’s probably the single most-used mathematical algorithm idea in history. And the main originator of this idea was Solomon Golomb, who died on May 1—and whom I knew for 35 years.

Solomon Golomb’s classic book Shift Register Sequences, published in 1967—based on his work in the 1950s—went out of print long ago. But its content lives on in pretty much every modern communications system. Read the specifications for 3GLTEWi-FiBluetooth, or for that matter GPS, and you’ll find mentions of polynomials that determine the shift register sequences these systems use to encode the data they send. Solomon Golomb is the person who figured out how to construct all these polynomials.

A fantastic and pretty comprehensive obit for Sol. He did miss out on more of Sol’s youth as well as his cross-town chess rivalry with Basil Gordon when they both lived in Baltimore, but before they lived across town from each other again in Los Angeles.

Many of the fantastical seeming stories here, as well as Sol’s personality read very true to me with respect to the man I knew for almost two decades.

👓 Robert J. McEliece, 1942–2019 | Caltech

Read Robert J. McEliece, 1942–2019 (caltech.edu)
Alumnus and engineering faculty member Robert J. McEliece has passed away.
May is apparently the month that many of the greats in information theory pass away. I was reminded of Sol Golomb’s passing in May 2016 the other day.

I didn’t know him well, but met Dr. McEliece a handful of times and at least a few of the books in my personal information theory library are hand-me-down copies from his personal library. He’ll definitely be missed.

Three open books piled on top of each other with McEliece's signature and dates in the top right hand of the first page and CalTech bookstore price stamps in them as well.

👓 Goro Shimura, a 'giant' of number theory, dies at 89 | Princeton

Read Goro Shimura, a 'giant' of number theory, dies at 89 (Princeton University)
Goro Shimura, Princeton's Michael Henry Strater University Professor of Mathematics, Emeritus, died on Friday, May 3, at the age of 89.