by Magda Peligrad
I would like to start by citing a comment made by a Murray Rosenblatt admirer, Professor Walter Philipp. In a meeting, where Murray was present, Walter mentioned that mathematicians are of three types: soldiers, heroes, and generals. He further explained that the “soldiers” are doing generalizations, the “heroes” solve some difficult problems, while “generals” invent important fields. Then he thanked Murray for inventing, among others, the field of limit theorems for mixing structures, which was embraced by many mathematicians. I am among those who worked in this field invented by Murray. I finished my PhD abroad, but I consider Murray as one of my advisers. After my arrival in the United States, I contacted him and asked for a letter of recommendation. He was extremely kind, and he helped me get a job even before we met in person. I had many opportunities to meet Murray and his wife in many professional meetings, in the US and abroad. We were very proud when he gave the key address at the first Cincinnati Symposium in Probability Theory in 1987, which was supported by the Taft Foundation. I felt very honored when he accepted to give the opening talk of my 60th birthday conference on “Limit Theorem for Dependent Data and Applications”, held in 2010 Paris, France.
I would like to take this opportunity to express my admiration for his genial work, for his immense kindness, and his luminous personality. I consider myself very lucky to work in the field Murray pioneered, to have met him in so many occasions and for the fact that he adopted me as one of his students.
Magda Peligrad is Charles Phelps Taft Professor of Mathematics at the University of Cincinnati.
