Max Newman

Max Newman
Max Newman on a mountain in North Wales, c. 1950
Born	Maxwell Herman Alexander Neumann (1897-02-07)7 February 1897 Chelsea, London
Died	22 February 1984(1984-02-22) (aged 87) Cambridge
Nationality	British
Fields	Mathematics
Institutions	St John's College, Cambridge University of Manchester Princeton University
Alma mater	St John's College, Cambridge
Doctoral students	Thomas Graham, Hubert Griffiths, Sze-Tsen Hu, Gilbert Robinson, Hsien Chung Wang
Known for	Elements of the topology of plane sets of points Newman's lemma Newmanry section at Bletchley Park Heath Robinson (codebreaking machine) Colossus computer Newman problem
Notable awards	Fellow of the Royal Society (1939) Sylvester Medal (1958) De Morgan Medal (1962)

Maxwell Herman Alexander "Max" Newman, FRS (7 February 1897 – 22 February 1984) was a British mathematician and codebreaker. His work in World War II led to the construction of Colossus, the world's first operational, programmable electronic computer, and he established the Royal Society Computing Machine Laboratory at the University of Manchester which produced the world's first working, modern stored program electronic computer in 1948, the Manchester Small-Scale Experimental Machine.

Max Newman was born Maxwell Neumann in Chelsea, London, England to a Jewish family, on 7 February 1897. His father was Herman Alexander Neumann, originally from the German city of Bromberg (now in Poland) who had emigrated with his family to London at the age of 15. Herman worked as a secretary in a company, and married Sarah Ann (Pike), an English schoolteacher, in 1896.

The family moved to Dulwich in 1903, and Newman attended Goodrich Road school, then City of London School from 1908. At school, he excelled in classics and in mathematics. He played chess and the piano well.

Newman won a scholarship to study mathematics at St John's College, Cambridge in 1915, and in 1916 gained a First in Part I of the Cambridge Mathematical Tripos.