Biography

John earned his BS at Wagner College in 1954, and his MA in 1957 and Ph.D. in 1960 at the University of Minnesota, writing under the direction of Bernard Gelbaum. He was an instructor at Yale 1960-1962, later a post-doctoral research fellow at Yale in 1968-1969, he joined SU as an assistant professor in 1962, and was promoted to associate professor in 1972 and then to professor in 1972.

He has been advisor to honors students in mathematics since fall 1990, principal advisor in mathematics since spring 1991, and advisor to elementary education students with dual major in mathematics since 1991. John is interested in Banach algebras and Banach speces, Banach algebras of differentiable functions, and nth roots of operators on Hilbert and Banach speces, and he has published 16 research papers. He has directed 7 Ph.D. students: David Brown (1965), John Daly (1970), Philip Downum (1970), Gopaldas Shah (1973), Michael Evans (1976), Robert Kantrowitz (1990), Joseph Gaskin (1993). He also directed senior honors theses for Eric Peterson 1991, Beth Harasimowics 1996 and Christopher Doyle 2000. Peterson was one of three students who won a prize of $500 each from the Honors Council for an outstanding thesis.

John was a member of the Executive Committee 1964-1965, 1969-1970 and 1973-1975, the Graduate Committee 1981-1984 and the Undergraduate Committee 1993-1994, faculty advisor to the Mathematics Library 1982 to the present, co-editor of the Undergraduate Student Newsletter for the Mathematics Department, 1994-1997, and a member of 6 ad hoc renewal, promotion or tenure committees. In the College he was on the Promotion Committee 1978-1980, on the Academic Committee 1989-1993, and chair of its subcommittee on Endowed Scholarships. John belongs to AMS and MAA.

Dan Shea (who earned his Ph.D at SU under Edrei in 1965) had gone to a party in 1963 given by a TA in English, had met Helga there and told John about her. Helga had earned a BA in 1955 at Hartwick and was teaching English at East High in Rochester. Dan arranged that the three of them go on a picnic on Labor Day in 1963. In 1964 John and Helga were married and they have two children John III and Laura. John III is married to Deborah. Laura is married to Michael, and they have a daughter Connie and a son Jackson. Helga taught for 20 years in the writing program at SU, and died in December 1998 after a long illness.

John III and his wife often have John over for dinner, and Laura and her husband have him visit them in Philadelphia several times a year. John III has driven him half way to Philadelphia, and Michael has driven up to meet them. John particularly enjoys his young grandchildren.

Sources: His January 1998 cv.; my conversations with John. --Phil Church-- 8/06/02