ALAN J. GOLDMAN

Alan J. Goldman, whose “passion for operations research and dedication to the use of mathematics to improve the human condition was an inspiration for all who knew him,” died Feb. 13 at his home in Baltimore. He was 77.

Dr. Goldman was a professor in the Department of Applied Mathematics and Statistics (formerly Mathematical Sciences) at Johns Hopkins University from 1979 to 1999, when he became emeritus professor. In this later role, he continued to teach and to mentor graduate students through the fall semester of 2009.

“All who came into contact with him were exposed to a man with tremendous intellectual energy and enthusiasm for ideas,” said Daniel Q. Naiman, professor and chair of Applied Mathematics and Statistics, in an article that appeared in the JHU Gazette. “In any context he could be counted on to ask the most penetrating questions. Still, we will remember him for his wonderfully warm, gentle and compassionate manner. He closed most conversations and e-mails with ‘Peace,’ and his behavior was consistent with this expression.”

The Gazette wrote that Professor Goldman, who worked for the National Bureau of Standards (now the National Institute of Standards and Technology) for nearly 25 years before entering academia, “considered his years of service at Johns Hopkins to be the most gratifying of his career.” “My father was very passionate about education,” Peter Goldman told the Gazette. “He loved teaching at Johns Hopkins. It was the love of his life.”

According to colleagues, Professor Goldman’s favorite application areas of operations research included facility siting, transportation systems and mathematical game theory.

In 1999, when he transitioned from fulltime to professor emeritus status, Professor Goldman’s colleagues and students paid tribute to him in a celebration called the “Goldmanfest.” In a brief biography written for the occasion, Jim Fills noted that Professor Goldman had published more than 100 papers and supervised another 200 more while directing 13 dissertations.

In the bio, Fills noted that Professor Goldman grew up in Brooklyn, N.Y. (within walking distance of the Coney Island amusement district) and received his B.A. from Brooklyn College in mathematics and physics in 1952. He earned his M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in ?mathematics from Princeton University in 1954 and 1956, respectively; his dissertation area was topology. From 1956 to 1961 he was an evening lecturer at American University and Catholic University of America, but his principal pre-Hopkins affiliation, from 1956 to 1979, was with the National Bureau of Standards, where he was founder and chief of operations research and also deputy chief of applied mathematics.

Among his many awards, Professor Goldman earned a U.S. Department of Commerce Gold Medal in 1976 and was elected in 1989 to the National Academy of Engineering.

Cynthia Goldman, Professor Goldman’s wife of nearly 50 years, preceded him in death in 2004.