Donald B. Gillies

Donald B. Gillies
Circa 1974, courtesy U-Illinois UC CS Dept.
Born	Donald Bruce Gillies (1928-10-15)15 October 1928 Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Died	17 July 1975(1975-07-17) (aged 46) Urbana, Illinois, USA
Residence	US
Nationality	Canadian
Fields	Mathematics, Computer Science
Institutions	University of Illinois, Stanford (sabbatical), National Research Development Corporation, UK
Alma mater	University of Toronto University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Princeton University
Doctoral advisor	John von Neumann
Doctoral students	Milos Dragutin Ercegovac Lawrence Joseph Henschen Allan William McInnes Ian Stocks Greg Chesson Alan M. Davis

Donald Bruce Gillies (October 15, 1928 – July 17, 1975) was a Canadian mathematician and computer scientist, known for his work in game theory, computer design, and minicomputer programming environments.

Donald B. Gillies was born in Toronto, Ontario, Canada and attended the University of Toronto Schools, a laboratory school originally affiliated with the University. Students at this Ontario school skipped a year ahead and so he finished his 13th-grade studies at the age of 18.

Gillies attended the University of Toronto (1946–1950), intending to major in Languages and started his first semester taking seven different language courses. In his second semester he quickly switched back to majoring in Mathematics which was his love while in high school. During his time as an undergraduate, he spent a great deal of time at the U-Toronto Computation Center. In the Putnam exam competition of 1950, Gillies was stunned at not being selected by the faculty to compete with the U-Toronto team. To avenge himself, Gillies placed in the top 10 in North America, following his University of Toronto classmates John P. Mayberry and Richard J. Semple who were top 5 Putnam Fellows. Toronto would likely have won the competition in 1950 had Gillies been on the faculty-designated team.

For graduate school, Gillies applied to the University of Illinois University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, which was "a very busy place building lots of computers". While he was there, he began working on the ORDVAC/Illiac I project. After one year of graduate school (1951), Gillies transferred to Princeton University to work with John von Neumann, at the urging of and also to be with John P. Mayberry, who was also studying under John von Neumann. Gillies and Mayberry were both arch-rivals and best friends, and after Mayberry beat Gillies in the Putnam exam, each competed to finish their PhD degree first.