March 23, 1942 – ____
Joseph
George Caldwell died on _____. He was
born in Kingston, Ontario, Canada, and moved with his family to the United
States in January, 1953. His family
lived in Lakeland, Florida, and Newark, Delaware, before settling in
Spartanburg, South Carolina, in June of 1956.
He graduated from Spartanburg High School in 1958 (the last graduating
class from the Frank Evans High School on Kennedy Street). He attended Carnegie Institute of Technology
(now Carnegie Mellon University) and received a BS degree in mathematics in
1962. He attended the University of
North Carolina at Chapel Hill and received a PhD degree in mathematical
statistics in 1966. For his doctoral
dissertation, he developed the best known class of
codes for correcting both additive and synchronization errors in noisy
communication channels. His dissertation
advisor was the renowned Indian mathematician, Raj Chandra Bose (who disproved
Euler’s 1782 conjecture about the existence of certain Graeco-Latin squares). In his professional career he worked both as
an independent consulting statistician and for contract-research consulting
firms. He was a Member of the Technical Staff
of Lambda Corporation, founded by Hugh Everett III (creator of the “Parallel
Universe” or “Many Worlds” theory of quantum mechanics, and the theory of Generalized
Lagrange Multipliers). In that role he
developed a practical method for obtaining approximate solutions to John Nash’s
Bargaining Solution to General-Sum Games.
Other positions he held included Principal of Planning Research
Corporation (PRC); Manager of Research and Development of the US Army
Electronic Proving Ground’s Electromagnetic Environmental Test Facility;
Adjunct Professor of Statistics at the University of Arizona; Director of
Management Systems for the (Central) Bank of Botswana; and President of Vista
Research Corporation. In the field of
software engineering, he developed the Civil Service Personnel Management
Information System for Malaŵi and the Education Management Information System for
Zambia. He was the author of several
books and numerous articles on divers topics,
including statistics, population and the environment, politics, religion and
music (guitar). His hobbies included
snow and water skiing, SCUBA diving, Tae Kwon Do, running, and music (guitar,
trombone and baritone horn (euphonium)).
In recent years he served as a consulting statistician in the field of
evaluation research, constructing sample survey designs for impact evaluation
of large economic development programs in foreign countries in Africa and Latin
America. Before retiring to Tucson,
Arizona he lived in a number of places, including Spartanburg, South Carolina; Alexandria
and Fairfax, Virginia; Clearwater, Florida; Charlotte, North Carolina; Toronto,
Ontario, Canada; Cairo, Egypt; Lilongwe, Malaŵi; Gaborone, Botswana and Lusaka,
Zambia.
His
first wife (deceased) was Timothy Gale Tinsley (1939-1989) of Gaffney, South
Carolina. His second wife (deceased) was
Jacquelyn Anne Reed Caldwell (1937-2016) of St. Louis, Missouri. He is survived by his third wife, Linda
DeWitt Caldwell of Tucson, Arizona. He
had three children, Joseph George Caldwell IV (deceased), Christopher Scott
Caldwell and Steven Lindsay Caldwell (deceased), of Tucson, Arizona. He is survived by his son Christopher; sister
Anita Lynn Caldwell Cathcart (Mrs. Donald S. Cathcart) of Spartanburg; brother
Charles Randolph Caldwell (husband of Nancy Wildman Caldwell) of Jasper,
Georgia; grandchildren Macy Cruse Caldwell and Kai Joseph Caldwell of Tucson. His father was Joseph George Caldwell (1921-1993)
of Belleville, Ontario, Canada and his mother was Evelyn Phyllis Barter
Caldwell (1919-2014) of Grand Cascapedia, Quebec,
Canada.
His
great-grandparents were Joseph Caldwell (1853-1931) and Edna Mary Conant (1855-1916)
of Belleville, Ontario, Canada. Edna Mary
was a direct descendant of Roger Conant (“Roger Conant the Pilgrim”, bapt. 1592-1678) who came to America on the Anne (second
ship, following the Mayflower) in 1623 and became the first Governor of
Massachusetts Bay Colony under the British Crown. The Conant family history is documented in
Thomas Conant’s books Upper Canada
Sketches (William Briggs, 1898) and Life
in Canada (William Briggs, 1903) (both available on the Internet). Roger Conant’s descendant, also Roger Conant
(b. 1748) moved his family to Canada in 1778-92.
File:
JosephGeorgeCaldwellObituary20210815
.doc
FndID(70)
FndTitle(Joseph George Caldwell
Obituary)
FndDescription(Joseph George Caldwell
Obituary)
FndKeywords(Joseph George Caldwell; obituary)