Remembering Basil Gordon , 1931 – 2012

B asil Gordon, who made major research contributions to number theory, combinatorics, and algebra and who enhanced our understanding of Ramanujan’s remarkable identities, passed away on January 12, 2012, at the age of eighty. Gordon, who was a professor of mathematics at UCLA, was an outstanding teacher at all levels. His legacy will continue, owing to the impact of his fundamental work and to the many students he groomed, as well as several other mathematicians he influenced. In this article, five noted mathematicians describe various contributions of Gordon and include personal reflections as well. Krishnaswami Alladi discusses Gordon’s research on partitions and extensions of Ramanujan’s identities. George Andrews describes Gordon’s work on plane partitions. Ken Ono’s article is on Gordon’s work on modular forms, whereas Robert Guralnick talks about Gordon’s contributions to algebra. Finally, Bruce Rothschild recalls how he and Basil Gordon ran the Journal of Combinatorial Theory, Ser. A, as managing editors. Keith Kendig, a Ph.D. student of Professor Gordon in the 1960s, conducted a detailed interview of Gordon in 2011 dealing with his life and mathematical career. The text of this interview with pictures of Gordon from his childhood will appear in Fascinating Mathematical People, to be published by Princeton University Press in 2014. Some pictures of Gordon, courtesy of Keith Kendig, are included here.