Professor Donald Paul Gaver, Jr.

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Gaver, Professor Donald Paul Jr. February 16, 1926 - February 11, 2018 Resident of Carmel and Monterey, CA Professor Donald Paul Gaver, Jr., an internationally noted mathematician specializing in statistics and operations research, died Sunday February 11, 2018 at his home in Monterey. Born in St. Paul, MN to Donald Paul Gaver and Dorothea Haman Gaver. Don graduated from the St. Paul Academy and served in the US Navy, 1944 to 1946. He attended MIT, obtaining BS and MS degrees in Mathematics. Subsequently he earned a PhD in Mathematics at Princeton University. Don met Frances Rouse Gaver while he was at MIT and she was a student at Wellesley College. They graduated in 1950 and married in 1953 before moving to Princeton together. His early professional career spanned the US Navy's Operations Evaluation Group, Westinghouse Research Labs and Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. In 1970 he moved to California to become Professor of Operations Research at the Naval Postgraduate School. He and Fran settled in Carmel Valley for almost forty-five years. Professor Gaver was named Distinguished Professor of the Naval Postgraduate School in 1983. Over the next decades his contributions were recognized with numerous professional honors, including the US Navy Distinguished Civilian Service Medal awarded by the Secretary of the Navy. He was perhaps most proud of his election as a Member of the National Academy of Engineering. Don and Fran loved traveling, and made many trips to Europe, Asia and Australia. At home, Don was known as a loyal, gregarious, and often mischievous friend and host. Don is survived by his wife Fran, three children: Elizabeth Gaver (husband Hans-Hinrich Thedens, son Mattias), Donald Paul Gaver III (wife Bernice Kaufman, daughters Manya and Elena), and William Gaver (wife Anne Schlottmann, daughters Elli and Charlie), as well as by his sister Nancy Priedeman, niece Katharine Priedeman White, nephew Bill Priedeman, and six grand-nephews and grand-nieces, and one great-grand-niece. Don's life will be celebrated on March 31 at 1pm at the Unitarian Universalist Church of the Monterey Peninsula.

Published on February 25, 2018