15 Facts About Alexander Aitken

Alexander Aitken was elected to the Royal Society of Literature for his World War I memoir, Gallipoli to the Somme.

Alexander Aitken was of Scottish descent, his grandfather having emigrated from Lanarkshire in 1868.

Alexander Aitken was educated at Otago Boys' High School in Dunedin where he was school dux and won the Thomas Baker Calculus Scholarship in his last year at school.

Alexander Aitken saw active service during World War I enlisting in April 1915 with the New Zealand Expeditionary Force, and serving in Gallipoli from November 1915, in Egypt, and at the Western Front.

Alexander Aitken spent several months in hospital in Chelsea before being invalided out of the army and shipped home to New Zealand in March 1917.

Alexander Aitken studied for a doctorate at the University of Edinburgh, in Scotland, under Edmund Taylor Whittaker where his dissertation, "Smoothing of Data", was considered so impressive that he was awarded a DSc degree in 1925.

Alexander Aitken was an active member of the Edinburgh Mathematical Society and a Fellow of the Faculty of Actuaries.

Alexander Aitken was one of the best mental calculators known, and had a prodigious memory.

Alexander Aitken was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1936 and an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Society of New Zealand in 1940, both for his work in statistics, algebra and numerical analysis.

Alexander Aitken was an accomplished writer, being elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 1964 in response to the publication of his war memoirs, Gallipoli to the Somme.

Alexander Aitken's book was the basis of an oratorio of the same name by the New Zealand composer Anthony Ritchie.

Alexander Aitken was an excellent musician, being described by Eric Fenby as the most accomplished amateur musician he had ever known, and was a champion athlete in his younger days.

The New Zealand Mathematical Society and London Mathematical Society Alexander Aitken Lectureship occurs every two years when a mathematician from New Zealand is invited by both Societies to give lectures at different universities around the UK over a period of several weeks.

An annual "Alexander Aitken Prize" is awarded by the New Zealand Mathematical Society for the best student talk at their colloquium.

Alexander Aitken married Winifred Betts, a lecturer in biology and the first female lecturer appointed to the University of Otago, in 1920.