Geary,robert,charles - an appreciation

Abstract

Roy Geary, Ireland's greatest statistician, died in Dublin on 8 February 1983, after a long life devoted to mathematical statistics. He was born on 11 April , 1896 and was educated at University College, Dublin, 1913-1918, obtaining a B.Sc. and an M.Sc, both with first class honours, in 1916 and 1917, respectively. In 1918 he was awarded a Travelling Studentship in Mathematics and attended the Sorbonne in Paris, 1919-1921. He was appointed to a lectureship in Mathematics at University College, Southampton, in 1922 but returned to Dublin in 1923 as a statistician in the Statistics Branch of the Department of Industry and Commerce, and remained there until 1949, apart from a brief period as Senior Research Fellow in the Department of Applied Economics in Cambridge, 1946-1947. He was Director of the Central Statistics Office in Dublin from 1949 to 1957, when he moved to New York for three years to head the National Accounts Branch of the United Nations Statistical Office. He returned to Dublin in 1960 to the Economic Research Institute, where he was to spend the rest of his life, as Director until 1966, as consultant thereafter. Among the many honours awarded him were three honorary doctorates and honorary fellowships of the Royal Statistical Society and American Statistical Association. He was President of the International Statistical Institute and a Council member of the International Association for Research in Income and Wealth. He was elected Fellow of the Econometric Society in 1951 and served as Council member from 1962 to 1964.