Yesterday (18/7/24) we scattered Tom's ashes on the banks of the River Tweed in Kelso as per his wishes. It was a long journey and a very sad day. We still can't believe he's gone. We miss him very much.
Friday 19 July 2024
Thursday 11 April 2024
OBITUARY FOR PROFESSOR THOMAS LEONARD (1948-2023) by Diego Andres Perez Ruiz for ISBA.
https://bayesian.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/2403.pdf
From the March 2024 issue of the ISBA bulletin reproduced below:-
OBITUARY FOR PROFESSOR THOMAS LEONARD (1948-2023)
Diego Andres Perez Ruiz
diego.perezruiz@manchester.ac.uk
With profound sadness, we announce the passing of Thomas Hoskyns Leonard, a distinguished
and pioneering statistician whose contributions to the field have left an indelible mark. A retired
professor from the Universities of Wisconsin-Madison and Edinburgh, Thomas Leonard’s career was
marked by ground-breaking work in Bayesian statistics and a deep commitment to interdisciplinary
research.
Thomas Leonard’s academic journey began at Imperial College London, where he earned a BSc in
Mathematics with First Class Honours in 1970. Immediately thereafter, he completed an MSc in
Statistics from University College London with Distinction and a PhD in Statistics from the same
institution. His early career saw him as a Lecturer at the University of Warwick, where he co-founded
the Department of Statistics and the innovative MORSE (Maths, Operations Research, Statistics, and
Economics) degree programme with Robin Reed and P.J. Harrison.
In 1979, Thomas Leonard moved to the United States, joining the University of Wisconsin-Madison
as an Associate Professor, later becoming a full Professor. His tenure at UW Madison was marked
by significant contributions, including his work at the Mathematics Research Centre. He worked
on improving the Bayesian components of both the teaching and research programmes, alongside
Kam Wah Tsui and Michael Newton. In 1995, he returned to the U.K. to lead the Department of
Mathematics and Statistics at the University of Edinburgh, a position he held until 2001.
A true visionary, Thomas Leonard co-founded the International Society for Bayesian Analysis (ISBA)
in 1992, alongside Arnold Zellner and Gordon Kaufman. In 2013, he was elected as a Founding
Fellow of ISBA. He also served as a committee member for multiple statistical societies, including
the Edinburgh Section of the Royal Statistical Society, contributing to numerous interdisciplinary
debates and initiatives.
Thomas Leonard’s academic work
Thomas Leonard’s academic work was both prolific and influential. His research in Bayesian Categorical Data Analysis is considered seminal, and his contributions to other areas have had farreaching impacts. His work on multinomial shrinkage estimators drew parallels with the cryptanalysis techniques of Alan Turing and his assistant I.J. Good, showcasing a profound connection
between historical methodologies and modern statistical analysis. Leonard’s approach to density
smoothing was similarly inspired by Good’s work, underscoring the depth and innovation of his
research and beautiful ideas.
His seminal contributions to Bayesian Categorical Data Analysis have been highly praised by leading
statisticians such as Alan Agresti and David Hitchcock and further expanded upon by distinguished
scholars Nan Laird and Terry Speed. His publications, including his co-authored book ”Bayesian
Methods: An Analysis for Statisticians and Interdisciplinary Researchers” and his work on the history of Bayesian statistics, have been widely recognised. Together with John Hsu, Leonard developed the conditional Laplacian approximations, offering a computationally accessible method forBayesian inference that has significantly advanced the field and is widely used today.
His constant search for understanding, and his tenacity as a researcher, led him to develop some of
the most difficult and influential theories in Bayesian Statistics. With Hsu, Chiu, and Tsui, Leonard
co-invented the matrix linear covariance model, a development recognised as foundational by econometricians James LeSage, Kelley Pace, and Manabu Asai. In his 1999 publication with John Hsu,
Leonard presented innovative alternatives to the expected utility hypothesis in economics, challenging traditional theories of risk aversion and offering new perspectives on economic behaviour.
Leonard’s interdisciplinary work extended into family medicine, where, in collaboration with Richard
L. Brown, Orestis Papasouliotis, and others, he played a crucial role in establishing the Wisconsin
Substance Abuse Programme. His influential work in obstetrics, particularly his 1981 invited discussion paper with Jim Low and colleagues, transformed the prediction of fetal metabolic acidosis,
marking a significant advancement in the field. His collaborations in geophysics with Ian Main and
others have been recognised as ground-breaking, further illustrating the wide-reaching impact of his
research.
Beyond Academia
Beyond academia, Thomas Leonard was a passionate advocate for mental health, providing expert
testimony and evidence to the Scottish Government. He submitted a large amount of anecdotal and
statistical evidence to the Scottish Parliament regarding the widespread devastating side effects of
psychiatric medications and electroconvulsive therapy.
His commitment to societal issues was evident in his extensive work on the history of eugenics,
including a significant submission to the Commission of Inquiry into the History of Eugenics at
University College London (UCL).
Thomas Leonard’s legacy is immortalised not only in his contributions but also in the lives of the
students and peers he inspired and mentored. His passing is a great loss to the statistical community
and to all who had the privilege of knowing and working with him. Thomas Leonard was an extraordinary person, kind, gentle, and generous in ways that few ever have the privilege to encounter
in their lifetime. We extend our deepest condolences to his family, friends, and colleagues.
His memory and contributions will continue to inspire and guide future generations of statisticians.
Tom, you will be profoundly missed.
Tuesday 23 January 2024
UCL Obituary.
https://www.ucl.ac.uk/statistics/news/2024/jan/it-sadness-we-share-news-passing-thomas-leonard-1948-2023
It is with sadness that we share the news of the passing of Thomas Leonard (1948-2023).
15 January 2024
It is with sadness that we share the news of the passing of Thomas Leonard (1948-2023). He obtained a doctorate from UCL Dept. of Stats (1966-1972).
He was a co-founder of ISBA events. You can also find an interview with Thomas Leonard at: https://bayesian.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/1612.pdf
Tuesday 16 January 2024
Warwick Obituary for Tom.
https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/sci/statistics/news/?newsItem=8a1785d88ce92c6d018d11a632681ece
Tom Leonard (1948-2023)
The department was saddened to hear of the death of Tom Leonard on December 18, 2023. Tom was one of the three founding members of staff of the Department in 1972, before leaving to take a position at the University of Wisconsin in 1980. He was influential in the development of the department's MORSE degree programme which flourishes to this day. RIP Tom.
Friday 12 January 2024
EULOGY FOR TOM by Scott Forster.
For his funeral held on 12/1/24.
We gather here today to remember our family member , friend, neighbour and colleague Thomas Leonard, better known to those who knew him as Tom.
Tom was born in Devonshire in 1948 and grew up in Plymouth. He studied Mathematics at Imperial College London and later University College London. He worked and taught statistics at Madison Wisconsin from 1979 to 1996. Tom co-founded the renowned International Society for Bayesian Analysis(ISBA) in 1993.
Moving to working at University of Edinburgh from 1995, Tom published two academic books in statistics (one in 1999 and one in 2001) before finally medically retiring in autumn 2001, aged 53. Tom was both proud of his time in academia but critical of its commercialization whereas he believed in the pursuit of knowledge for human advancement.
Tom was a seeker of truth and justice. He was always on a spiritual journey and so moved from church to church and was an unsparing critic of where he felt Christians failed to live up to what was required of them. He moved from Episcopalian to Church of Scotland to Quakers before finally finding a home at Augustine United Church which he found to be welcoming and so the right fit for him.
He spoke truth to power whether in statistics, churches or society at large. He was a strong supporter of the LGBTQ+ community of which he was a part, speaking out against gay discrimination by the US military on the Madison Wisconsin campus in 1989.
He spoke out regularly in support of the disabled and neurodiverse and very strongly in support of Palestinians, taking part in protests in solidarity with them . He worried deeply for the future of the world and urged us to act to change it.
His battles with mental health issues are well documented and motivated him to become a campaigner on the issue with him fighting for improved treatments that went beyond the medical model and him seeing mental health issues as a product of our social and political contexts.
As a retired academic, thinking, writing and reading was his bread and butter from his retirement until the last weeks of his life. He would love to debate and argue passionately on many topics from religion to politics, history to science, literature to philosophy.
Tom was a prolific writer. He co-wrote and published two academic textbooks on statistics and his personal history of statistics was published by Wiley . Alongside those he has a catalogue of numerous unpublished poems, essays, short stories, novels and a yet to be published book of LGBTQ+ history .
It was through creative writing that Tom met his flatmate of 10 years Scott . Tom was in a writer's group Scott had begun attending. Eventually dissatisfied with what was felt to be its stifling intellectual atmosphere they split off and both Scott and Tom co-founded a new writers group which they hoped would prove freer air to breathe and the group lasted a number of years.
Another aspect of Tom was that he had a long standing interest in the history of eugenics and its consequences on society. From the perspective of his subject statistics, he was ashamed of its origins in eugenics.
One of his proudest moments was when Tom and Scott went together to University College London in 2019 to present the evidence they had co-wrote together to the inquiry into University College London’s involvement in eugenics.
Until the pandemic in 2020 Tom was socially active regularly going to the Royal Statistical Society meetings in Edinburgh and making contributions including giving a presentation oh the history of statistics, going to a chess group, going to a reading group at the Botanic gardens and going to bowls and scrabble at his church.
With the pandemic he became more fearful and health conscious as many of us did and perhaps rightly so as his health woes increased considerably.
After 2020 he became more withdrawn, spending much of his time in the flat writing, reading and watching sports. Plymouth Argyll was his favourite team. World cups were major events for him.
Tom was a compulsive player of chess and champion of scrabble. We would go over to Julie's house at Christmas and New year and he was a serious and competitive player whereas Julie and Scott were more light hearted about it. He would brook no messing about or silliness. This wasn't just a game to him. He could be witty and charming, stubborn and difficult, eccentric and thought provoking. There will only ever be one Thomas Leonard. He was one of a kind. We will all miss him deeply.
...
Thursday 28 December 2023
Tom's life story.
Some of Tom's life story is recounted in his autobiographical work, Life of a Bayesian Boy.
- born in Flete House, Yealmpton, Devonshire in 1948
- In 1966 took the Great Western train from Plymouth to Paddington to study Mathematics at Imperial College London.
- University College London, on Gower Street, where he was accepted to study for an intensively difficult advanced level Masters and a Ph.D. in the first ever university Statistics department,
- offered a lectureship at the University of Warwick, to start in September 1972
- SABBATICAL YEAR (1978-79)
- taught Statistics 775
- finally returned to the University of Warwick in August 2017, after 38 years to attend a Quakers Annual Meeting. But late in 2017, I suffered two serious falls which damaged my left leg. I nevertheless celebrated my 70 th birthday in Vittoria Restaurant on 24th March 2018, with 37 guests including John and Serene Hsu from Santa Barbara, and Diego and Diane Perez from Manchester.
- In July 2019, I returned from UCL after almost 50 years to give evidence with my flatmate Scott Forster, as expert witnesses to the Commission of Inquiry into the History of Eugenics at UCL. It was good to meet Professor Tom Fearn once again, and our verbal and written submissions were well received. I was delighted to learn during January 2021 about the sweeping decisions made by UCL based on the Commission's recommendations,
Reflections on Tom as co-founder of Edinburgh All Comers Writers Club. An informal recounting.
By Scott Forster, flatmate friend and Co-founder of the Edinburgh All Comers Writers Club.
The recording of history is a vital act and a more complete history remains to be written.
Edinburgh All Comers writers Club was founded as a split away from another writing group which a number of us found to be intellectually stifling since it was run by a group of 3 rich men and was artistically and politically conservative and very unwelcoming not to mention discouraging and increasingly capitalist as we were demanded to pay funds while many of us were disabled unemployed. It provided an example of what not to do as a creative writing group and was seared into our memories as a negative experience.
Edinburgh All Comers Club ( which moved from Jeremiahs Taproom in Elm Row, Edinburgh to meeting every Tuesday at 7pm at Sofia's bar, Henderson Street in Leith ) was intended to be a polar opposite to the previous group- free to attend, democratic, inclusive and encouraging. It shaped everything we did. We lasted 3-4 years.
I(Scott) was pushy in urging the group to adopt a code of conduct which was eventually adopted even if it occasionally attracted its detractors. The intention was to avoid a repeat of the sexism, ableism, racism etc of the previous group. I think largely we managed to escape those problems.
In it's best days the group ,while small, was a hotbed of creative experimentation, deep discussions on politics, religion, literature, art and philosophy providing a stimulating space for the exchange of texts and ideas, providing a temporary escape from the travails of life. There was humour, agony aunt sharing of personal lives and we all challenged each other.
But the group eventually fell apart as egos and personality clashes dwindled down the membership until only a core including the founders were left attending. Writers group tend to not always attract the best people.
Negatively for myself this discouraged me from writing groups and even writing itself for some time , something I'm only just returning to since 2023.
However the experience was not wholly negative. Out of it a number of members had success such as publications or featured on radio stations. We would like to think we played a small part in that.
This is the old website for the club which can be accessed using the wayback machine https://web.archive.org/web/20160402102448/http://edinburgh.writersclub.org.uk/
The description we gave was,
The Edinburgh All-Comers Writers Club is a democratically-organised and convivial group which meets every Tuesday evening for the purpose of encouraging creative writers and poets of all abilities, including beginners and accomplished authors.
Participants are welcome to bring along a short sample of whatever they’re working on to read to the group – though there is no pressure if you don’t fancy reading anything out, you don’t have to. Just come along and join us for what will surely be the most intellectually-stimulating and enjoyable thing you will do on a Tuesday evening!
If you are reading, try and bring around 8 copies of your work, so everyone can read along. All types of creative work are accepted. Each reading will be followed by a constructive discussion and general writing-related banter.
The group meets from 7-10pm every Tuesday in the back room at Sofi’s Bar, 63-65 Henderson Street. It really is a lovely venue for the group!
Here's a poem Tom wrote in 2019 to our friend and fellow Edinburgh All Comers Writers Club member the great Scottish Poet Lindsay Oliver,
TO LINDSAY AND THE SPIRIT OF THE PALESTINIAN BOY by Tom Leonard
TO LINDSAY AND THE SPIRIT OF THE PALESTINIAN BOY
by Tom Leonard
I met her in the All Comers Writers Club,
That Scott created fair space for,
Before the dog chased us out of Jeremiah's Taproom.
Then in Sofi's we prospered,
All in all a motley crew
That splintered as if in a bizarre novel
Leaving only the steadfast well bonded.
And now all those hipster lunches in the Roseleaf,
Trips around the Lothians and the Tweed,
And festive times happily spent,
Are good memories soon to be resumed.
Freya and Hera entwined,
She writes of
Fairies who become children
Children who become birds
That between the Bass Rock and Tantallon fly
Birds who become fairies
And fight with the pixies
That from Trimontium scamper.
She composed Wake up my Son
Mind searingly about the Palestinian boy,
And wrote poems about the black victims of the rabid police,
And about all souls who are slain in vain
By the evil ripples that shuffle above.
Lindsay likes Kath and they both like cats;
She is the spirit of the short story in the Spiegeltent
And its time so well spent.
She lives with MS
While I wither and dither
From maladies man-made
She lives in her daughters, acrobatic and wild
And in her grandson, who is such a smart child.
Retired lecturer from Heriot-Watt.
She worked in Michigan when I haunted Wisconsin
Applied psychologist and mathematician too
She lives in Number One One One Cornhill Terrace
A haven for the spirit people and the ravens in the trees
She's taught me perceptions which I never knew.
My wife and my Polish girl were the loves of my life,
Not to forget the Mayflower Rose,
But Lindsay stands tall
As the soundest woman I have known
As she stands on her pedestal and reclines on her throne.
MCGINTY'S CAT
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