Friday, November 16, 2007

Around the table


At many of Gene's seminars and lunch series, he would ask all the participants around the table or lecture hall to give their name and position. He was quite particular about people giving both their first and last names. We thought it would be nice to honor his wishes on this blog. For those who wish to, would you list your full name as well as when you met or how you knew Gene?

We have removed the registration requirement from the comments, so everyone should be able to post.

(post date altered for sorting reasons.)

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

My name is Michele Benzi and I have
met Gene for the first time when I
was a PhD student at North Carolina
State University, working on my
dissertation in numerical linear
algebra with Carl Meyer as an advisor. The year was 1992. Of
course by then I was well aware of
Gene's enormous importance and
influence on our field. After his
talk (it was on cyclic reduction
with application to iterative methods
for the convection-diffusion equation, joint work with Howard
Elman) there was a reception
during which he made a point to
meet all of us graduate students.
"Hi, I'm Gene Golub! What's your
name and what are you working on?"
That was the beginning of a 15 year
relation. Over the years Gene has
visited me in Bologna, at CERFACS,
at Los Alamos, and finally at Emory, and I have been his guest
at Stanford. We have co-authored four papers. I have countless memories of him, and I owe Gene a lot for
his encouragement and support over
the years. For sure there have been
ups and downs in our friendship
(as it's true for many of us), but in the end things have always worked out, since Gene seemed
unable to hold a grudge for too
long. I am still having a hard time
coming to terms with his passing.
Goodbye, Gene. You will always be
remembered.

Margot Gerritsen said...

My name is Margot Gerritsen. I first met Gene in 1991 when I joined the SCCM program at Stanford as a graduate student. After my PhD I spent 5 years in New Zealand, and returned to Stanford in 2001. I was lucky to come back and enjoy Gene's company for several more years. Whether in his good books or in his bad books, I thoroughly enjoyed Gene, and admired him greatly. Stanford feels empty now.

Puppy said...

I am sorry I haven't talked to you for so long.

:(

Bye my friend.

Master of None said...

My name is Vidya Rangasayee and I first met Gene in September 2002 when I started my Masters in SCCM. To me SCCM and Gene are almost synonymous. Even several years after I left Stanford with my Masters, I would make it a point to pop into his room when I visit Stanford. Gene still remembered my name and would enquire about my kids and work and encourage me to attend the SCCM seminars on Monday evenings. I won't feel the same visiting Gates Building now without Gene around.

Unknown said...

Gene Golub's friends and colleagues will gather around the globe on Friday February 29, 2008, the date that would have been his 19th birthday, to mourn his passing and celebrate his life. In addition to a memorial and a technical day at Stanford, events will also take place in more than 30 other locations and more than 20 other countries.

Friends and colleagues of Gene are invited to attend any of these events. See
http://www.cs.nyu.edu/overton/genearoundtheworld/

Best regards to all
Michael Overton

Anonymous said...

I was born Manuel G. Visaya. I didn't meet Golub, nor Boltzmann nor Heisenberg.

Rest in peace Gene H Golub

Chao, Hongyang said...

My name is Hongyang Chao. In 1994, Gene invited me to visit SCCM. I stayed there for a year and left for Texas. Once he sent a greeting to me and asked "How is Texas? Do you miss here?"

I went to Stanford for a very short visit of Gene in Nov. of 2005. He was very happy and looked very healthy then. We took a picture in his office. Here is the picture link.

http://ss.sysu.edu.cn/faculty/chhy/
images/golub_chao2.jpg

It was a shock to know Gene has been gone. I thought I would visit him again once I got another chance. Stanford has a lot of wonderful professors. Gene is one of them. "Gene, how is the heaven? You will be missed forever."

Enrico Onofri said...

I learned most of my notions about numerical analisys of linear operators from Gene's papers and the marvelous book with Van Loan. I included Gene's
picture among the Great mathematicians and physicists in the Gallery of my book
http://www.fis.unipr.it/~enrico.onofri/#Lezioni
I like to look at him in a good company.
Hope most of you will agree,

Enrico

kads said...

My name is Kedar Gajanan Kale. I graduated from Stanford in ME in 2006. I attended one of Gene's talks in the ICME seminar series in 2005. When asked about his illustrious career by the seminar organizer, he responded with a statement that stuck with me - 'If you hang in there long enough, good things will happen to you." That's admirable humility. RIP

katch wreck said...

Wow, it's hard to believe this November marks 10 years since Gene died. It feels like just a few years ago I was taking his Numerical Linear Algebra course at the Scientific Computing and Computational Mathematics / Computational and Mathematical Engineering institute at Stanford University.

In addition to his wealth of knowledge and experience, he was one of the nicest professors ever. I remember him taking me out to lunch and we would tell each other about our Jewish Russian backgrounds. He wanted to meet my dad Boris Korenblum some day but it didn't work out although he emailed me from Russia in the Summer of 2007. He was exploring his roots and heritage in the old country but I never talked to him again due to his unexpected and tragic passing.

I still miss Gene a lot and I thank you for setting up this Blog. I hope we can continue to honor Gene on the 10th anniversary of his leaving us in life but his works will go on continually.

Cheers to a great mathematician, engineer, and friend!

Daniel Korenblum
MS SCCM/ICME 2009