Skip to main content

Meyer Dwass (1923-1996) Papers

 Collection
Identifier: 11/3/19/9

  • Staff Only
  • No requestable containers

Scope and Contents

The Meyer Dwass Papers fill 2 boxes and span the years 1953 to 1996. The bulk of the papers consist of his teaching and research notes as well as offprints of his journal publications; a small amount of personal material is included. The papers fall into six subseries: biographical, correspondence, university notes, teaching, research, and publications.

Biographical materials include a 1979 curriculum vitae, reports of professional activities, and news releases from the University regarding Dwass's hire and promotion. The papers include obituaries for Dwass and his wife (Dwass's obituary mentions "his companion, Frieda Landau"). Of special interest are photocopied pages of a journal he kept intermittently from 1955 to 1960, with family details, opinions, and musings. The journal pages demonstrate the interest Dwass took in his children. Also of interest are a monthly planner for the 1978-1979 academic year and notes for a humorous Purim talk he delivered during the year he spent teaching in Israel.

The letters are few but are nonetheless representative. A letter from the Dean of Faculties and one written to Dwass's daughter Emily provide insight into an empathetic nature, with reference made to people in need. Also included are a letter to a scholarly journal editor and a note about a Yiddish reading group Dwass formed.

Two sets of miscellaneous university-related notes that Dwass took for his own benefit relate to the immigration-status hearing of a visiting faculty member and about the Budget and Resources Advisory Committee that he chaired in 1973-1974.

Dwass's teaching files are comprised of typed supplemental class notes on "Statistics Using the Computer" for Math C30; handwritten class notes for C51, Multivariate Analysis; extensive notes for his class at Hebrew University on "Analysis of Variance;" and unidentified notes labeled "Math. Stat. R139, Non-Parametric Statistical Inference."

The research files consist of a folder of formulas and notes written on loose paper or taken from notebooks and eleven Israeli school copybooks or exam books filled with Dwass's mathematical notations, bibliographic citations, and drafts of speeches or articles. Four of the copybooks have notations on the cover ("Bibl," "Explicit Dstins," "Poisson Process," and "Asymptotics"); two are stapled together; two are numbered (I and II); the remainder have no markings on the covers.

Dwass's publications consist of both published and unpublished articles. Reprints of about forty articles include many that appeared in Annals of Mathematical Statistics and other specialized mathematics journals. Included are several technical reports prepared on behalf of, or with funding from, the U.S. military (the Office of Naval Research and the Air Force Office of Scientific Research) or reports on projects funded by the National Science Foundation. Publications also include three folders of notes and drafts for a book on linear models that he worked on in the late 1970s.

Dates

  • 1953-1996

Creator

Conditions Governing Access

This collection is stored off-site and requires two business days advance notice for retrieval. Please contact the McCormick Library at specialcollections@northwestern.edu or 847-491-3635 for more information or to schedule an appointment to view the collection.

Extent

2.00 Boxes

Language of Materials

English

Abstract

Meyer Dwass, a mathematical statistician interested in applied probabilities, was a professor at Northwestern University and Chair of the Department of Statistics. His papers fill 2 boxes and span the years 1953 to 1996. The bulk of the papers consist of his teaching and research notes as well as offprints of his journal publications; a small amount of personal material is included. The papers fall into six subseries: biographical, correspondence, university notes, teaching, research, and publications.

Arrangement

The papers of Meyer Dwass are organized into: biographical materials; correspondence; university notes; teaching; research; and publications.

Method of Acquisition

This series was transferred to the University Archives by Melanie Reuben of the Department of Mathematics on September 4, 1998, as Accession No. 98-164, and combined with materials from the University Archives Faculty Biographical Files.

Separated Materials

Three inches of duplicate and extraneous material were discarded. Three of Dwass's books were separated and added to the University Archives' Faculty Authors Collection.

Processing Information

Processed by Missy Roser; April 2002.

Title
Guide to the Meyer Dwass (1923-1996) Papers
Author
Missy Roser
Date
01/04/2002
Description rules
Describing Archives: A Content Standard
Language of description
English
Script of description
Latin
Language of description note
eng

Library Details

Part of the Northwestern University Archives Repository

Contact:
Deering Library, Level 3
1970 Campus Dr.
Evanston IL 60208-2300 US
847-491-3635