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Griffith Conrad Evans was born in Boston, Massachusetts on May 11, 1887 and died on December 10, 1973. He received his A.B. in 1907, his M.A. in 1908, and his Ph.D. in 1910, all from Harvard University. After receiving the Ph.D. he studied from 1910-12 at the University of Rome on a Sheldon Traveling Fellowship from Harvard. He began his teaching career in 1912 as assistant professor at the newly established Rice Institute in Houston, Texas and remained there until 1934. In 1934 he accepted the position of chairman of the Department of Mathematics at the University of California, Berkeley, which he held until 1949. He retired in 1954 but taught there one more year.
Professor Evans' scientific interests and publications concerned three fields: functional analysis, potential theory, and mathematical economics. His first paper was on the first of these subjects and was published in 1909. During the ensuing ten years he contributed a great deal to this field. His principal results concerned certain integro-differential equations and integral equations with singular kernels. Evans received early recognition of his work in that field when he was invited to deliver the Colloquium Lectures before the American Mathematical Society on the subject "Functionals and Their Applications." These lectures were published in the American Mathematical Society Colloquium Publications.
In 1920 he published the first of his famous research papers on potential theory, a field in which he was certainly the foremost authority in this country for many years. By using the then new general notions of integration and certain classes of functions (now known as Sobolev spaces), he was able to obtain basic results on all the important problems in the field, such as the Dirichlet and Neumann problems, and to discuss the differentiability properties and boundary behavior of the solution functions. One of his most beautiful results is his proof of the existence of a surface of minimum (electric) capacity among all surfaces spanning a given curve; this was shown to be the equipotential surface of a certain harmonic function defined on a two-leaved three-dimensional space having the curve as branch-curve. Such a space is a three-dimensional analog of a Riemann surface in the complex plane. This led him into his extensive research on multiple-valued harmonic functions, his principal interest during his later years.
Evans' work in mathematical economics was that of a pioneer. At a time when economists disdained to give mathematical treatments of economic questions, he boldly formulated a model of the total economy in terms of a few macro-economic variables and proposed the related index number problem of how to define the aggregate variable in terms of these micro-economic components. Today such models are commonly used and the index number problem is still important. Evans' study of the treatment of production in terms of cost functions, after Cournot, has led to the discovery of a duality between these functions. In Berkeley, Evans held a seminar in mathematical economics which soon became internationally known, providing an inspiring educational activity and establishing a tradition of mathematical economics on the Berkeley campus.
Professor Evans was a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Science, the American Philosophical Society, and many other such societies. He received many honors; for example, he was Faculty Research Lecturer in Berkeley in 1950 and gave invited addresses in connection with the Harvard Tercentenary and the Princeton Bicentennial celebrations.
Evans was brought to Berkeley as a result of a nationwide search with a mandate to build up the Department of Mathematics in the same way that Gilbert Lewis had already built the chemistry faculty. Evans struggled with himself to effect the necessary changes with justice. His innate sense of fairness, modesty, and tact brought eminent success.
The weekly seminar which met at his home was attended by students and faculty and promoted a friendly and informal atmosphere in the department. Evans' retirement did not diminish his interest in science nor subtract from his pleasure at seeing others achieve goals he cherished.
The charming hospitality of the Evanses is remembered with pleasure by those fortunate enough to have been guests at their home. And Evans' own keen dry sense of humor was much appreciated by his many friends and associates.
C. B. Morrey, Jr.
H. Lewy
R. W. Shephard
R. L. Vaught
Professor Evans' scientific interests and publications concerned three fields: functional analysis, potential theory, and mathematical economics. His first paper was on the first of these subjects and was published in 1909. During the ensuing ten years he contributed a great deal to this field. His principal results concerned certain integro-differential equations and integral equations with singular kernels. Evans received early recognition of his work in that field when he was invited to deliver the Colloquium Lectures before the American Mathematical Society on the subject "Functionals and Their Applications." These lectures were published in the American Mathematical Society Colloquium Publications.
In 1920 he published the first of his famous research papers on potential theory, a field in which he was certainly the foremost authority in this country for many years. By using the then new general notions of integration and certain classes of functions (now known as Sobolev spaces), he was able to obtain basic results on all the important problems in the field, such as the Dirichlet and Neumann problems, and to discuss the differentiability properties and boundary behavior of the solution functions. One of his most beautiful results is his proof of the existence of a surface of minimum (electric) capacity among all surfaces spanning a given curve; this was shown to be the equipotential surface of a certain harmonic function defined on a two-leaved three-dimensional space having the curve as branch-curve. Such a space is a three-dimensional analog of a Riemann surface in the complex plane. This led him into his extensive research on multiple-valued harmonic functions, his principal interest during his later years.
Evans' work in mathematical economics was that of a pioneer. At a time when economists disdained to give mathematical treatments of economic questions, he boldly formulated a model of the total economy in terms of a few macro-economic variables and proposed the related index number problem of how to define the aggregate variable in terms of these micro-economic components. Today such models are commonly used and the index number problem is still important. Evans' study of the treatment of production in terms of cost functions, after Cournot, has led to the discovery of a duality between these functions. In Berkeley, Evans held a seminar in mathematical economics which soon became internationally known, providing an inspiring educational activity and establishing a tradition of mathematical economics on the Berkeley campus.
Professor Evans was a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Science, the American Philosophical Society, and many other such societies. He received many honors; for example, he was Faculty Research Lecturer in Berkeley in 1950 and gave invited addresses in connection with the Harvard Tercentenary and the Princeton Bicentennial celebrations.
Evans was brought to Berkeley as a result of a nationwide search with a mandate to build up the Department of Mathematics in the same way that Gilbert Lewis had already built the chemistry faculty. Evans struggled with himself to effect the necessary changes with justice. His innate sense of fairness, modesty, and tact brought eminent success.
The weekly seminar which met at his home was attended by students and faculty and promoted a friendly and informal atmosphere in the department. Evans' retirement did not diminish his interest in science nor subtract from his pleasure at seeing others achieve goals he cherished.
The charming hospitality of the Evanses is remembered with pleasure by those fortunate enough to have been guests at their home. And Evans' own keen dry sense of humor was much appreciated by his many friends and associates.
C. B. Morrey, Jr.
H. Lewy
R. W. Shephard
R. L. Vaught
This University of California obituary is available at THIS LINK