Eugene Lukacs

Who was Eugene Lukacs?

Eugene Lukacs was a Hungarian statistician born in Szombathely, notable for his work in characterization of distributions, stability theory, and being the author of Characteristic Functions, a classic textbook in the field.

From six weeks after birth Lukacs lived in Vienna, Austria. There he received primary and secondary education and studied mathematics at University of Vienna. His professors included Hans Hahn, Eduard Helly, Walter Meyer, Leopold Vietoris and Wilhelm Wirtinger. In 1930 he earned his doctorate in geometry under the supervision of Walter Meyer, and a degree in actuarial science in 1931. Eugene met his future wife Elizabeth Weisz in 1927 at the University of Vienna, and they married in 1935. He taught secondary mathematics for two years and later accepted a position with an insurance company, where Eduard Helly and Z. W. Birnbaum were colleagues. After Germany annexed Austria in 1938, he decided to emigrate to the United States, arriving in 1939.

In 1953 Eugene joined the Office of Naval Research USA, and became the director of Statistics. While at ONR he also taught at American University in Washington, D.C.