John Tukey's parents recognised that he had great potential while he was still only a child so the arranged for him to be educated at home rather than in school. This was possible since his parents were themselves teachers. His formal education began only when he entered Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island to study mathematics and chemistry.
After being awarded his Master's Degree in chemistry from Brown University, Tukey went to Princeton University in 1937 to study for his doctorate in mathematics. He received his doctorate in 1939 for a dissertation Denumerability in topology which was published in 1940 as Convergence and uniformity in topology. He had already had three papers published before his doctorate was awarded and, in after graduating he was appointed as an instructor at Princeton.
External events were to play a major role in the direction of Tukey's career since he joined the Fire Control Research office to contribute towards the war effort. The work here involved statistics and Tukey quickly found the work very much to his liking. There were other statisticians in Princeton, also contributing towards the war effort, in particular Wilks and Cochran and Tukey soon began exchanging ideas with these men.
When World War II ended in 1945 Wilks, by this time well aware of Tukey's remarkable statistical talent, offered him a post in statistics within the mathematics department at Princeton. However one post was not enough to absorb his energy and, also in 1945, Tukey joined the AT&T Bell Laboratories.
Tukey's first major contribution to statistics was with his introduction of modern techniques for the estimation of spectra of time series. E J Hannan, reviewing Tukey's papers on this topic writes:-
They show a remarkable uniformity of attitude characterised by a realistic recognition of the complexity of the situation, a consequent distrust of asymptotic theory, the use of standard statistical techniques as providing benchmarks rather than (say) precise confidence intervals, continual questioning of assumptions, emphasis on computational aspects, emphasis on ways of presenting the analysis, this presentation in ways familiar to the main users rather than in ways adopted in mathematical treatments, the early recognition of the superior qualities of digital devices for general purposes (as compared to analog devices) and a conspicuous fascination with new words and phrases, some of which have become established. There is, of course, also the introduction of new methods, some of which have proved to be important. These include methods for estimating spectra, spectra of higher moments, complex demodulation, methods for determining the magnitude and sign of initial impulses observed after transmission through a (more or less) fixed linear system and the Fourier analysis of the logarithm of a spectral estimate to discern echoes.
In 1965, in a paper with J W Cooley published in the Mathematics of Computation, he introduced the important 'Fast Fourier Transform' algorithm. For many people this will be the work for which is best known. However, it is only a small part of a large number of areas with he made significant contributions. His work on the philosophy of statistics and of research is summarised by A D Gordon to include the following topics:-
... the usefulness and limitation of mathematical statistics; the importance of having methods of statistical analysis that are robust to violations of the assumptions underlying their use; the need to amass experience of the behaviour of specific methods of analysis in order to provide guidance on their use; the importance of allowing the possibility of data's influencing the choice of method by which they are analysed; the need for statisticians to reject the role of 'guardian of proven truth', and to resist attempts to provide once-for-all solutions and tidy over-unifications of the subject; the iterative nature of data analysis; implications of the increasing power, availability and cheapness of computing facilities; the training of statisticians.
Tukey also made substantial contributions to the analysis of variance and the problem of making simultaneous inferences about a set of parameter values from a single experiment. Many of his papers are written with others and one of his co-authors, F Mosteller writes :-
John loves to work with others, and many have had the pleasure in participating in his genius. Variety and breadth mark his accomplishments. He works successfully on both large- and small- scale problems and on both practical and theoretical problems. ... He is always eager to respond to new questions, and he gives generously of his time and ideas.
Article by: J J O'Connor and E F Robertson