Quiet Contributor: The Civic Career and Times of John W. Tukey

Abstract

Across 60 years, John W. Tukey contributed to the advancement of democracy, peace and industry via development, application and teaching of knowledge. In his nation's service, he contributed to the Nike missile defense, U-2 spy plane, surveillance satellites in space, hydrophones in the oceans, seismic data interpretation and communications code breaking. As computer and communication pioneer, Tukey collaborated with von Neumann, Shannon and Pierce; coined "bit'' and "software''; applied statistical time series methods to processing signals; and recognized the usefulness of fast Fourier transform algorithms to digital processing of correlated data. Practical problems inspired Tukey to invent new ways to analyze data. As teacher and author, he made these available to others. Tukey advised government and industry regarding environmental quality, educational testing, the census, pharmaceutical efficacy, manufacturing quality and technologies for gathering intelligence. This paper explores the civic career, influences and philosophies of a practicing data analyst, inventor and remarkable public servant.