Francis John Anscombe, 83, Mathematician and Professor
By WOLFGANG SAXON
Published: October 25, 2001
Francis John Anscombe, a mathematician who helped computerize statistical analyses while seeking to avoid flawed interpretations of such data, died Oct. 17 at his home in New Haven. He was 83.
The cause was Alzheimer's disease, according to Yale University, where he retired in 1988 as emeritus professor of statistics.
Mr. Anscombe, a native of England, was invited to join the Yale mathematics department in 1963 by Tjalling C. Koopmans, an economist who later shared a Nobel Prize for his theories on the optimal allocation of resources. He asked Mr. Anscombe to organize a separate department of statistics, of which he became the founding chairman.
His mission was to build the department's graduate programs with established Yale statisticians, whom he recruited from disciplines like epidemiology and public health, economics and mathematics. He headed the department for six years.
In using computers to analyze statistical data, he drew on his expertise in the sampling of inspections for industrial quality control, the philosophical foundations of probability and the analysis of variance. Besides publishing 50 research articles, he wrote a classic text, ''Computing in Statistical Science Through APL'' (Springer, 1981), which remains in print. (APL is short for A Programming Language.)
He was emphatic in cautioning against misdiagnosing and misapplying computer models without obtaining the necessary proof. He detailed the need for great care in a celebrated paper in 1973 by demonstrating how one equation could neatly fit four different sets of data.
Francis Anscombe was educated at Cambridge University on a scholarship. He received a degree in mathematics in 1939 and a master's degree in 1943. In World War II, he worked on mathematical aspects of firing rockets.
He spent some time at an experimental station, applying statistics to agriculture. After lecturing at Cambridge, he was on the faculty of Princeton University from 1956 until his appointment at Yale.
Mr. Anscombe is survived by his wife of 47 years, Phyllis Rapp Anscombe; three sons, Francis R. and Anthony of Chicago, and Frederick F. of Bulgaria; a daughter, Elizabeth Valeika, also of Chicago; a brother, Anthony, of Camberley, England; and five grandchildren.