Ned Crow’s work as a mathematician went beyond the average person’s understanding, but he was such an expert that if he told you something, “you could take it the bank,” said a colleague, Marty Miles of Boulder.
Crow was 89 when he died at his Boulder home Oct. 29 after a long battle with cancer and Alzheimer’s.
A celebration of his life is planned at 2 p.m. Saturday at Unitarian Universalist Fellowship, 1241 Ceres Drive, Lafayette.
“He was a true expert in his field,” said Miles, noting that Crow wrote a small, slender book, called “Statistics Manual,” that is considered a “bible” among statisticians.
“It is thorough, understandable and simple,” said Miles.
But Crow’s work often escaped members of his family. His wife, Eleanor, laughed as she related how his son-in-law, Gary Crow-Willard, who works in electronic data, said, “I didn’t even understand the first sentence” of one of his books.
But she understood much of it – she was a math major too. They met at the University of Wisconsin when they were in graduate school. Eleanor Crow went on to have a career with the Colorado Civil Rights Commission.
Ned Crow was an expert in radio-wave propagation (studying the influences on radio waves) and on designing scientific tests, Miles said.
He was a statistician for the National Bureau of Standards and the National Center for Atmospheric Research and taught courses at the University of Colorado at Boulder.
Family and friends said Crow was modest and taciturn.
“You could walk in and ask him a question, and he would sit motionless,” Miles said. “He was so focused, you’d think he fell asleep.”
Eventually, he would answer.
“He never wasted words,” said his daughter Nancy Crow.
Daughter Dorothy Crow-Willard said her dad was good at explaining things, “but I usually got more information than I wanted.”
Ned Crow expected a lot out of his daughters “and for us to live up to our capabilities,” said Nancy Crow.
Both of his daughters are lawyers. But Nancy Crow said she never measured up in her father’s only sport: tennis.
“I was hopeless,” she said.
Ned Crow left “a roomful of tennis trophies,” said his wife.
In addition to math, Crow was vitally interested in classical music and was on the Boulder Philharmonic board.
Edwin L. Crow was born on a Wisconsin dairy farm Sept. 15, 1916. He graduated from high school there and earned his bachelor of science degree in chemistry from Beloit (Wis.) College, and his Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin. He married Eleanor Gish on June 13, 1942.
In addition to his wife and daughters, he is survived by three grandchildren.
Staff writer Virginia Culver can be reached at 303-820-1223 or vculver@denverpost.com.
