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First of all, sorry if this post is not appropriate for this forum.

I have a habit that every time I read a beautiful article I look at the author's homepage and often find amazing things.

Recently I read a paper of Andrew Hicks and when I opened his homepage I found many links about his invention: Flawless wing mirrors (car mirror).

enter image description here (Image Source)

I would not be surprised if this invention was made by a non-mathematician. His mirror is an amazing invention to me because every day I see it, but didn't know its inventor is a mathematician! Anyway, I want to ask

Question 1: Are there mathematicians who have done outstanding/prominent non-mathematical work like inventions, patents, solving social/economical/etc. problems, papers in these areas, etc.?

Of course, one can say that almost all technology nowadays is based on the work of mathematicians, but I'm asking for specific contributions/innovations.

I want to ask a similar question (Maybe it will be useful for those who are looking for a job!):

Question 2: Which mathematicians are working in non-mathematical areas/companies?

Note: Please add to your answers the name and the work of the mathematician.

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    $\begingroup$ Unabomber has to be #1 on this list. $\endgroup$
    – Piyush Grover
    Commented Aug 20, 2020 at 15:26
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    $\begingroup$ Not clear if it fits, but Emanuel Lasker was a Chess World Champion and a mathematician. I understand that he proved some important results in Commutative Algebra. $\endgroup$
    – Nick S
    Commented Aug 20, 2020 at 15:42
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    $\begingroup$ A good question here would need good delineation of "mathematician" and of "non-mathematical work". In the absence of that, I find this vague and I've downvoted $\endgroup$
    – user44143
    Commented Aug 20, 2020 at 17:32
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    $\begingroup$ The question is too vague. Before 18 century, all mathematicians had non-mathematical jobs since there were no mathematical jobs.So probably you mean modern times. It is also not clear who exactly is counted as a mathematician. $\endgroup$
    – Alexandre Eremenko
    Commented Aug 20, 2020 at 23:24
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    $\begingroup$ @Piyush if we put Unabomber on the list, then we should also make room for André Bloch, mathematician and triple murderer. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/André_Bloch_(mathematician) $\endgroup$
    – Gerry Myerson
    Commented Aug 20, 2020 at 23:50

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Samuel Eilenberg, one of the key mathematicians of the XX Century (co-created category theory, systematized homological algebra, opened new roads in topology, etc), was a good example:

he had (at least) TWO LIVES, with only one thing in common, his short name, Sammy.

In the first one he was the mathematician, whereas in the other he was a formidable expert and collector of Chinese and far-eastern ancient pottery (and other artifacts as well). He was world-famous in his second life just like he was in his first one (when he died he donated his immense collection to NYC, you can still admire it here).

What is funny (and a bit odd ) is this: Sammy did not like to mix his two lives at all. At his funeral, the two groups (mathematicians and art collectors) collided for the first and last time. Nobody could believe that Prof. Eilenberg, the Math Genius, and Prof. Eilenberg, one of the greatest authorities in ancient eastern arts, were one and the same man.

POST SCRIPT

I have done some research on Sammy's life as art collector: apparently, he was struck by the beauty of indian art during a trip to India. From that point on, he decided that he had to assemble a collection of eastern art and craftmanship, which he did in the next 30 + years. Now I finally see what the two Eilenberg had in common: a passion for aesthetics, for the formal beauty of structures. Alex Heller wrote the following words to honor his Teacher Sammy:

As I perceived it, then, Sammy considered that the highest value in mathematics was to be found, not in specious depth nor in the overcoming of overwhelming difficulty, but rather in providing the definitive clarity that would illuminate its underlying order. This was to be accomplished by elucidating the true structure of the objects of mathematics. Let me hasten to say that this was in no sense an ontological quest: the true structure was intrinsic to mathematics and was to be discerned only by doing more mathematics. Sammy had no patience for metaphysical argument. He was not a Platonist; equally, he was not a non-Platonist. It might be more to the point to make a different distinction: Sammy’s mathematical aesthetic was classical rather than romantic.

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    $\begingroup$ One might say that, because of his contributions to the theory of finite automata, he was also a computer scientist which, if we don't consider this part of mathematics, is a third domain of specialty. $\endgroup$
    – Gro-Tsen
    Commented Aug 21, 2020 at 0:40
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    $\begingroup$ @Gro-Tsen Then I might also add Edward Spanier to the list. Also more known as a mathematician; but published fundamental, and much cited, work in theoretical computer science; mostly with S. Ginsburg. Eilenberg's work in automata theory is clearly written and still inspirational after almost 50 years, but most TCS-Researchers know that he is a famous mathematician too. However, Spanier, I guess most TCS people do not know that he is a mathematician at all. At least it is not that well-known. $\endgroup$
    – StefanH
    Commented Aug 21, 2020 at 14:56
  • $\begingroup$ @StefanH A small thing, but it's Edwin, not Edward, Spanier. $\endgroup$
    – Danny Ruberman
    Commented Aug 24, 2020 at 1:00
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    $\begingroup$ @DannyRuberman Oh yes, I am sorry. Thank you! $\endgroup$
    – StefanH
    Commented Aug 24, 2020 at 11:25
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Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (1832-1898), better known as Lewis Carroll.

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    $\begingroup$ please expand, Noam :-). surely you can name a few things done/invented/made by Dodgson which you find outstanding... $\endgroup$
    – Franka Waaldijk
    Commented Aug 20, 2020 at 15:12
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    $\begingroup$ Well, probably his universally-known fictional books qualify for "outstanding/prominent non-mathematical work", or am I missing something? $\endgroup$
    – Francesco Polizzi
    Commented Aug 20, 2020 at 15:15
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    $\begingroup$ @BradyGilg His day job was as a mathematician. That most people don't know it doesn't make him any less of one :). $\endgroup$
    – Denis Nardin
    Commented Aug 20, 2020 at 16:47
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    $\begingroup$ If we had to quibble, it would be by saying that a mathematics lecturer at Oxford at the time wasn't expected to be a mathematician in the modern sense (i.e., a research mathematician). He did do a bit of research (I once used a lemma on his on determinants), but apparently didn't really try to be part of the research community (and there was such a thing in the UK at the time, though nothing compared to France or Germany). At any rate, that's really quibbling - Noam's answer is of course right, and we should be happy to call Dodgson a mathematician. $\endgroup$
    – H A Helfgott
    Commented Aug 23, 2020 at 9:36
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    $\begingroup$ I've also used Dodgson condensation en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dodgson_condensation in one of my own papers. He certainly counts as a research mathematician in practice even if he technically wasn't one on paper. $\endgroup$
    – Terry Tao
    Commented Aug 23, 2020 at 16:53
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I have noticed, after reading all previous answers, that no woman mathematician was listed.

My first impression is that most women mathematician born before 1960 (or maybe until today), are outstanding in non mathematics areas as they must have been activist for just having the chance of studying. Many of them were not even recognized or could work as mathematicians, because universities didn't hire women professors. A sad example is that of Emmy Noether who taught for seven year without income from the university. But besides this, there are many women contributing for medicine and biology, social equity, and inclusions of minorities in mathematics. But they are ghosts, as we do not see or know them. Here is a list with some of them: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_women_in_mathematics

Here are two examples: Sophie- Germain, who, besides being a important mathematician of her time, contributed to elasticity theory and to philosophy - her philosophical work were admired and cited by Auguste Comte. She has struggled to study in her time but were recognized by the great mathematicians Lagrange and Gauss, even after they discovered that she was not Monsieur LeBlanc. ( Her history is worth reading: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sophie_Germain )

More recently, we have Eugenia Cheng, who is a category theorist and an accomplished pianist. She is also a writer engaged in mathematical popularization and has a column in The Wall Street Journal.

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    $\begingroup$ I went to a mathematics lecture by Eugenia once and she played the keyboard in the middle of it ;) $\endgroup$
    – Hollis Williams
    Commented Aug 22, 2020 at 0:08
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    $\begingroup$ Kovalevskaya had manifold interests and wrote a novel, but apparently it was not very good (to go by my memories of what is stated in Ann Hibner Koblitz's excellent biography, which I unfortunately don't have at hand). Perhaps we need a separate question on "first-rate mathematicians who can't focus and keep doing non-outstanding work in other fields", taking care of course not to forget elements of the set who are women. $\endgroup$
    – H A Helfgott
    Commented Aug 23, 2020 at 9:27
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    $\begingroup$ "Kovalevskaya had manifold interests" Pun intended, @HAH? $\endgroup$
    – Gerry Myerson
    Commented Aug 23, 2020 at 23:35
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    $\begingroup$ Lilian Pierce has also introduced musical interludes in her mathematical talks. She won the 2018 Sadosky Prize for research that "spans and connects a broad spectrum of problems ranging from character sums in number theory to singular integral operators in Euclidean spaces" including in particular "a polynomial Carleson theorem for manifolds". She is an associate professor of mathematics at Duke University, and a von Neumann Fellow at the Institute for Advanced Study. By age 11 she began performing professionally as a violinist. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lillian_Pierce $\endgroup$
    – Gerry Myerson
    Commented Aug 23, 2020 at 23:39
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    $\begingroup$ We will probably need a separate, (very) long list of "mathematicians who are talented instrumentalists". $\endgroup$
    – H A Helfgott
    Commented Aug 24, 2020 at 8:12
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Noam D. Elkies, who gave an answer to this question, is himself also an accomplished composer.

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    $\begingroup$ Interesting. Is he currently active in mathematics? $\endgroup$
    – C.F.G
    Commented Aug 20, 2020 at 15:37
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    $\begingroup$ OMG. He is also winner of the 1996 World Chess Solving Championship!! duo to wiki. $\endgroup$
    – C.F.G
    Commented Aug 20, 2020 at 15:40
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    $\begingroup$ I think it would be topologically satisfying if Noam could write something about the achievement in physics of some mathematician gmvh ;-). $\endgroup$
    – Peter - Reinstate Monica
    Commented Aug 21, 2020 at 8:05
  • $\begingroup$ Although he states his rating is nothing to brag about, he's also a chess master. Take it from a guy that has been playing casually since age 5, that isn't an easy feat. $\endgroup$
    – Paul Burchett
    Commented May 9, 2022 at 4:46
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Fields medallist Cédric Villani is a French politician.

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    $\begingroup$ en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_mathematician-politicians has a long list of people who "achieved notability both as academically-trained mathematicians (with a graduate degree, or published in mathematical journals) and also as elected politicians (at a state or national level)." Daniel Biss was a member of the Illinois Senate. Kathleen Ollerenshaw was Lord Mayor of Manchester. Paul Painlevé was Prime Minister of France. $\endgroup$
    – Gerry Myerson
    Commented Aug 20, 2020 at 23:58
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    $\begingroup$ The mathematician Borel was a cabinet member under the mathematician Painleve, who was Prime Minister of France. $\endgroup$
    – Zarrax
    Commented Aug 21, 2020 at 3:28
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    $\begingroup$ @C.F.G there is no shortage of deceiving, lying, hypocritical and/or illogical mathematicians. $\endgroup$
    – Gerry Myerson
    Commented Aug 21, 2020 at 7:33
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    $\begingroup$ @C.F.G There is nothing stopping a mathematician from asserting something he or she believes to be untrue in the hope of ultimately gaining something from this deception ("suppose for a contradiction that ... ") $\endgroup$
    – Gordon Royle
    Commented Aug 21, 2020 at 8:15
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    $\begingroup$ Paul Painlevé was also the first person to be an airplane passenger in France. $\endgroup$
    – Richard Stanley
    Commented Aug 21, 2020 at 16:28
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Omar Khayyam was a Persian mathematician, astronomer, philosopher, and poet. As a mathematician, he is most notable for his work on the classification and solution of cubic equations, where he provided geometric solutions by the intersection of conics. Khayyam also contributed to the understanding of the parallel axiom. As a poet, he gave us the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam – "A Jug of Wine, a Loaf of Bread—and Thou."

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    $\begingroup$ +1. Rubaiyat in MIT website? $\endgroup$
    – C.F.G
    Commented Aug 23, 2020 at 6:25
  • $\begingroup$ Yes, that's the one. $\endgroup$
    – Gerry Myerson
    Commented Aug 23, 2020 at 6:33
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    $\begingroup$ He was also one of the contributors to Solar Hijri calendar which is more accurate than the Gregorian calendar. (The GC has 1 day non-accurate after 3320 years while SHC has 1 day non-accurate after 3770 years!!) $\endgroup$
    – C.F.G
    Commented Aug 27, 2020 at 7:43
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    $\begingroup$ I think it is not clear that the mathematician Khayyam is the same as poet Khayyam. at least in Iran, I hear arguments about it between historians. $\endgroup$
    – ali
    Commented Jul 21, 2021 at 18:30
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Jim Simons - probably best known to mathematicians for his work on the secondary characteristic classes developed various mathematical models for market trading that have been highly successful. He is an outstanding philanthropist, using much of the income from his financial engineering work to support lots of research activities through e. g. the Simons foundation: the Simons investigators awardees list includes such names as Aaronson, Aganagic, Bhargava, Daubechies, Eskin, Kapustin, Katzarkov, Kitaev, Mirzakhani, Okounkov, Ooguri, Poonen, Rouquier, Seidel, Tao, ...

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    $\begingroup$ By "best known" I assume you mean best known published mathematics? The Medallion Fund, Renaissance Tech, and the Simons foundation are more well known overall by a factor of thousands. $\endgroup$
    – Brady Gilg
    Commented Aug 20, 2020 at 16:39
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    $\begingroup$ @BradyGilg Thanks, tried to clarify. Feel free to edit it, it is community wiki $\endgroup$
    – მამუკა ჯიბლაძე
    Commented Aug 20, 2020 at 16:45
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    $\begingroup$ From the known histories, the early strategies used by Medallion Fund (which became the basis for Renaissance Technologies) were derived basically by James Ax. Later strategies were created by Elwyn Berlekamp. It seems Simons' contributions were more in the business and management aspects. Not saying this to lessen him. Realistically, given the lack of success Berlekamp had later in finance, management (and hiring) practices may be more significant than actual strategies. I think this is also more inline with the intent of the question. $\endgroup$
    – Chan-Ho Suh
    Commented Aug 21, 2020 at 3:24
  • $\begingroup$ @Chan-HoSuh Robert Mercer is an electrical engineering PhD who also made significant contributions to Renaissance Tech, but much greater contributions to digital image processing. I did not know about James Ax. Thank you! $\endgroup$
    – Ellie K
    Commented Jul 27, 2021 at 14:42
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Anna Kiesenhofer is a mathematician at Lausanne. She works in PDE, and has nine publications listed at researchgate.

She just won a gold medal in cycling at the Tokyo Olympics.

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    $\begingroup$ see also meta.mathoverflow.net/a/5102/11260 $\endgroup$
    – Carlo Beenakker
    Commented Jul 25, 2021 at 13:58
  • $\begingroup$ This deserves a separate thread, on mathematicians who are into sports. Incredible achievement! $\endgroup$
    – Rajesh D
    Commented Jul 29, 2021 at 2:32
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Emanuel Lasker was a great mathematician and is regarded as one of the best chess players ever. If it counts.

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    $\begingroup$ I think it's appropriate for that comment to be turned into an answer, especially since it's CW. $\endgroup$
    – Tim Campion
    Commented Aug 21, 2020 at 11:42
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    $\begingroup$ And indeed World Chess Champion from 1894 to 1921, the longest period of time anyone has been World Chess Champion. $\endgroup$
    – Rosie F
    Commented Aug 23, 2020 at 11:47
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    $\begingroup$ Interesting! I knew him first as a chess player - I didn't know that he was also a mathematician. $\endgroup$
    – Zubin Mukerjee
    Commented Aug 24, 2020 at 19:36
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    $\begingroup$ Emanuel Lasker was a great chess player, one of the best ever, and a not insignificant mathematician: he proved a basic result on ideal theory - it's familiar (in a more general form due to Noether) to anybody who has taken a course in algebraic number theory. $\endgroup$
    – H A Helfgott
    Commented Sep 16, 2020 at 13:29
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    $\begingroup$ Another way to put it is that he was someone who had an excellent paper a couple of years after his thesis, unfortunately never got a permanent job, and decided to focus on other things (including one at which he was the greatest of his age). $\endgroup$
    – H A Helfgott
    Commented Nov 25, 2020 at 19:02
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Tom Lehrer published a couple of papers in mathematical statistics, and taught Mathematics at University of California, Santa Cruz for many years, but is undoubtedly better known for his three albums of humorous songs.

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    $\begingroup$ Let us not forget his work on analytic and algebraic topology of locally Euclidian metrization of infinitely differentiable Riemannian manifolds. $\endgroup$
    – Aurelio
    Commented Aug 21, 2020 at 14:19
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    $\begingroup$ @Aurelio : And this, he knew from nothing! $\endgroup$
    – gspr
    Commented Aug 21, 2020 at 14:40
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    $\begingroup$ Incidentally, Lehrer has recently put all his lyrics in the public domain, and made them available for download until 2024. tomlehrersongs.com $\endgroup$
    – Gerry Myerson
    Commented Nov 25, 2020 at 22:28
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Bertrand Russell was a mathematician well-known for his philosophical and political work.

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    $\begingroup$ Bertrand Russell was a philosopher who did also some math. His work in philosophy is still taught, his work in mathematics is not. $\endgroup$
    – Michael Greinecker
    Commented Aug 20, 2020 at 21:42
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    $\begingroup$ @Michael The Principia are still a well-researched subject. The interest in it is by no means just historical. $\endgroup$
    – Andrés E. Caicedo
    Commented Aug 20, 2020 at 23:11
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    $\begingroup$ @TimothyChow: those programming languages and proof assistants are based on descendants of Church’s type theory. Russell’s type theory was very different, and I’ve never heard of it being taught in this connection. That said, I agree that Principia continues to be very relevant. $\endgroup$
    – Peter LeFanu Lumsdaine
    Commented Aug 21, 2020 at 0:26
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    $\begingroup$ @NajibIdrissi My point is that by all reasonable standards Russell was a philosopher who also did some math (with Whitehead) that grew out of his philosophical work. TO me this answer reads a bit like "Edward Witten is a mathematician well-known for his work in physics." $\endgroup$
    – Michael Greinecker
    Commented Aug 21, 2020 at 7:40
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    $\begingroup$ You know you’ve made it when people spend inordinate amounts of time arguing whether you were a mathematician who did philosophy or a philosopher who did mathematics, all the while completely ignoring your Nobel Prize in Literature. $\endgroup$
    – Dan Romik
    Commented Aug 22, 2020 at 4:42
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From Wikipedia: Hermann Günther Grassmann (German: Graßmann, pronounced [ˈhɛʁman ˈɡʏntɐ ˈɡʁasman]; 15 April 1809 – 26 September 1877) was a German polymath, known in his day as a linguist and now also as a mathematician.

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    $\begingroup$ May be it should be said that he left Mathematics disappointed by the reception of his work and because his posibilities of teaching math were very low due to really bad reports, for example by Kummer. His book was almost ignored for more than two decades; now it is considered the father of linear algebra. $\endgroup$
    – Xarles
    Commented Aug 22, 2020 at 15:21
  • $\begingroup$ @Xarles, have you read Kummer's report, and if so, do you know if it can be found online? What you wrote is a common narrative; I also heard another one - that Kummer's report was completely accurate, and whatever in Grassmann's writing we now deem important was buried in the many pages of his unclear, unrigorous and hardly readable text. I have no opinion of my own though. $\endgroup$
    – Kostya_I
    Commented Aug 24, 2020 at 20:54
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    $\begingroup$ When I looked into Grassmann's book Die Lineale Ausdehnungslehre, ein neuer Zweig der Mathematik from 1844, my impression was, that he aimed to explain his ideas and results to philosophers like Kant. The second edition Die Ausdehnungslehre. Vollständig und in strenger Form begründet from 1862 seems already like a standard text on linear algebra. $\endgroup$
    – Peter Michor
    Commented Aug 30, 2020 at 6:19
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Felix Hausdorff wrote philosophical works, essays, poems and plays under the pseudonym Paul Mongré. Let me quote from the information of the Hausdorff Center for Mathematics in Bonn:

https://www.hcm.uni-bonn.de/about-hcm/felix-hausdorff/about-felix-hausdorff/

Hausdorff pursued, especially during the early years in Leipzig, a kind of double identity: as Felix Hausdorff, the productive mathematician, and as Paul Mongré. Under this pseudonym, Hausdorff enjoyed remarkable recognition within the German intelligentsia at the end of the 19th century as a writer, philosopher and socially critical essayist....Between 1897 and 1904, Hausdorff reached the peak of his literary-philosophical accomplishment: during this period, 18 of a total of 22 works were published under his pseudonym. These included the volume of aphorisms Sant’ Ilario: Thoughts from Zarathrustra’s Country, his critique Das Chaos in kosmischer Auslese, a book of poems entitled Ekstases, the farce Der Arzt seiner Ehre, as well as numerous essays....The play was Hausdorff’s greatest literary success, as it was performed over 300 times in 31 cities.

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I think that the name of Archimedes immediately springs to mind. Among its inventions are the block-and-tackle pulley systems based on the lever, the screw, the parabolic reflectors used to burn Roman ships attacking Syracuse, the mechanical planetarium.

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    $\begingroup$ The story of the parabolic reflectors used to burn Roman ships attacking Syracuse is not true. It is a legend. $\endgroup$
    – Philippe Gaucher
    Commented Aug 23, 2020 at 14:17
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    $\begingroup$ The story is in Polybius, Plutarch and Lucian of Samosata. The Wikipedia page on Archimedes says that there are still an ongoing debate about its truth; however, some models of reflectors have been built demonstrating that the construction of such weapons was actually possible with the technology that Archimedes had at his disposal. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archimedes $\endgroup$
    – Francesco Polizzi
    Commented Aug 23, 2020 at 16:21
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    $\begingroup$ The wikipedia page mentions some experiments indeed but the weapon requires a lot of luck. A catapult or flaming arrows are far much easier to use for the same effect. $\endgroup$
    – Philippe Gaucher
    Commented Aug 23, 2020 at 17:38
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Paul Painlevé was briefly prime minister of France on two separate occasions, as well as holding many other government posts including Minister of Defense. In mathematics, he is best remembered for his contributions to nonlinear differential equations.

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    $\begingroup$ I mentioned Painlevé in a comment on the answer that proposed Villani. $\endgroup$
    – Gerry Myerson
    Commented Aug 21, 2020 at 7:30
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    $\begingroup$ Before being mainly involved in politics (mostly $\ge 1910$), Painlevé had (1897-1906) a significant involvement in defending Alfred Dreyfus, see Des mathématiciens dans l'affaire Dreyfus (French) $\endgroup$
    – YCor
    Commented Aug 21, 2020 at 16:20
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Frank Ryan earned a math PhD from Rice for the dissertation "Characterization of the set of asymptotic values of a function holomorphic in the unit disc." He published two fundamental papers on the set of asymptotic values of a function holomorphic in the unit disc in Duke Mathematical Journal. [the papers, not the unit disc, were in the journal] He was an assistant professor at the Case Institute of Technology, 1967-71. He has an Erdős number of 3. He was also a lecturer in mathematics at Yale University, 1977-86.

But he is best-known as a quarterback in the National Football League, 1958-70. He led the Cleveland Browns to an NFL title in 1964.

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Gauß contributed to the development of the telegraph. Gauß was also an astronomer, metrology engineer and land surveyor.

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  • $\begingroup$ Really????????? $\endgroup$
    – C.F.G
    Commented Aug 20, 2020 at 17:39
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    $\begingroup$ @C.F.G Well, I don't think it was the fundamental theorem of algebra or quadratic reciprocity that got his name attached to the unit of magnetic flux density. $\endgroup$
    – Andreas Blass
    Commented Aug 20, 2020 at 17:48
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    $\begingroup$ Major inventions are not usually made by a single person (there were lightbulbs before Edison), and the telegraph is no exception. But Gauss made an essential contribution. $\endgroup$
    – Michael Renardy
    Commented Aug 20, 2020 at 21:19
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    $\begingroup$ @C.F.G : Is it a coincidence that your initials are the same as Gauss's? If not, your astonishment is a bit amusing! $\endgroup$
    – Timothy Chow
    Commented Aug 20, 2020 at 23:15
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    $\begingroup$ Some details are at en.wikipedia.org/wiki/… $\endgroup$
    – user44143
    Commented Aug 21, 2020 at 1:28
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Persi Diaconis is an accomplished magician, in addition to his mathematical career.

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Martin Hairer has written a widely used professional audio editing software "Amadeus Pro" (https://www.hairersoft.com/).

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I'm surprise no-one has mentioned Isaac Newton. He spent almost half his career outside academia fighting against forgery at the Royal Mint. He was also an MP and wrote a huge amount on biblical chronology, alchemy, and theology.

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Harald Bohr was a member of the Danish national football team for the 1908 Summer Olympics, where he won a silver medal. The semi-final against France was 17-1.

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    $\begingroup$ Interesting result!!! $\endgroup$
    – C.F.G
    Commented Aug 23, 2020 at 14:09
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    $\begingroup$ Interestingly, Harald Bohr played professional football also together with his older brother, Niels, who also had a prominent science career. $\endgroup$
    – Uri Bader
    Commented Aug 30, 2020 at 10:05
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Ron Graham's mathematical work is probably familiar to most users of this website.

In his youth, he won a title as California state trampoline champion. In 1972 he was elected president of the International Jugglers' Association.

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  • $\begingroup$ I think later on he also won regional titles in table tennis after getting destroyed by Erdos in a table tennis game and then deciding that he had to improve. $\endgroup$
    – Hollis Williams
    Commented Jan 14, 2021 at 22:07
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    $\begingroup$ @Hol, D. J. Albers (1996) A Nice Genius, Math Horizons, 4:2, 18-23, DOI: 10.1080/10724117.1996.11974993, "[in 1963] I saw this rather senior guy of 50 [Erdos], already quite famous, playing ping-pong during one of the breaks. He asked me if I wanted to play and I agreed. He absolutely killed me! I had played casual ping-pong but I couldn't believe that this old guy had beaten me. ... I went back to New Jersey ... I bought a table, joined a club, started playing at Bell Labs, and in the State league. I eventually became the Bell Labs champion at ping-pong, and won one of the New Jersey titles." $\endgroup$
    – Gerry Myerson
    Commented Jan 14, 2021 at 22:22
  • $\begingroup$ Also, I think mathematics is the only subject where someone aged 50 is an ''old guy''. $\endgroup$
    – Hollis Williams
    Commented Jan 14, 2021 at 23:48
  • $\begingroup$ @Hollis I think maybe Ron meant it was (relatively) old for ping-pong. $\endgroup$
    – Gerry Myerson
    Commented Jan 15, 2021 at 1:45
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Nikolai Durov, who launched Telegram with his brother Pavel Durov, has some works on Arakelov geometry.

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I think Greg Egan (sci-fi author) qualifies. He has a few papers on arxiv, and made the news for his work on superpermutations, which motivates the title 'Mathematician'. He is also an occasional MO-user.

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    $\begingroup$ I think Egan would be a great answer to a different question, of people whose profession is not "mathematician" doing good maths $\endgroup$
    – Yemon Choi
    Commented Aug 20, 2020 at 18:08
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    $\begingroup$ @YemonChoi why don't you ask that as a separate question? I'd answer Aubrey de Grey. $\endgroup$
    – Nik Weaver
    Commented Aug 20, 2020 at 23:05
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    $\begingroup$ @NikWeaver : That question arguably already exists. $\endgroup$
    – Timothy Chow
    Commented Aug 20, 2020 at 23:18
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    $\begingroup$ @TimothyChow and Egan and de Grey are both answers there! Never mind, then. $\endgroup$
    – Nik Weaver
    Commented Aug 21, 2020 at 0:16
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I am on the fence regarding whether this question should stay open, but while it does, I thought the following example might be of interest: Peter Rosenthal, perhaps best known to mathematicians for his work on subspace lattices of operator algebras (see e.g. his book with Heydar Radjavi), developed a 2nd career/mission as a lawyer.

Wikipedia link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Rosenthal

Link from comments: 2014 profile in the Toronto Star

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    $\begingroup$ While he definitely seems to be vocal about being left-wing, the causes he represent are more often regarding basic human rights than left-wing. E.g., he has represented many cases of police brutality; see this beautiful piece on Toronto Star: thestar.com/news/crime/2014/01/05/… $\endgroup$
    – pinaki
    Commented Aug 21, 2020 at 2:42
  • $\begingroup$ @auniket thank you for the clarification. I must admit that originally I omitted the adjective and then added it at the last-minute in a confused effort at sign-posting, since I couldn't remember the details that I'd heard from friends on the Canadian scene $\endgroup$
    – Yemon Choi
    Commented Aug 21, 2020 at 2:49
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Per Enflo, a Swedish mathematician known for solving the so called ``basis problem'', one of the problems from Scottish book (about the existence of Schauder basis). Besides being a mathematician he is also known as a talented pianist.

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Joseph Fourier was also an Egyptologist.

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    $\begingroup$ He was a bit more than just that. Excerpts from hiw biography on wikipedia include: "He took a prominent part in his own district in promoting the French Revolution, serving on the local Revolutionary Committee. ... Fourier accompanied Napoleon Bonaparte on his Egyptian expedition ... Cut off from France by the British fleet, he organized the workshops on which the French army had to rely for their munitions of war ... In 1801, Napoleon appointed Fourier Prefect (Governor) of the Department of Isère in Grenoble, where he oversaw road construction and other projects." $\endgroup$
    – HJRW
    Commented Aug 22, 2020 at 11:03
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    $\begingroup$ @HJRW Equally, one should also mention Gaspard Monge, who was on the same expedition to Egypt, similarly held political appointments during the Revolution and all the while also is known for his results in geometry and as being the father of optimal transport. $\endgroup$
    – mlk
    Commented Aug 23, 2020 at 6:34
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Mathematician Eric Temple Bell

President of the MAA, 1931-32
Author of the book Men of Mathematics
Bell numbers, Bell polynomials
etc.

Also was a successful science fiction author under the pseudonym John Taine.

See the fascinating book
Reid, Constance, The Search for E.T. Bell, MAA spectrum, The Mathematical Association of America, 1993

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Otto Iulievich Schmidt is now best remembered for his polar expeditions and a geophysical institute in Russia bears his name. The English wikipedia does not mention it, but he was also one of the founders of the modern theory of groups and had a strong influence on A.G. Kurosh.

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    $\begingroup$ Oh -- that's the Schmidt from Krull-Remak-Schmidt! $\endgroup$
    – darij grinberg
    Commented Aug 21, 2020 at 20:07
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    $\begingroup$ In the late 1950s, I had a textbook on group theory written by O.J.Schmidt (in Russian). It was very nice. $\endgroup$
    – Wlod AA
    Commented Nov 27, 2020 at 19:21
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Richard Garfield is a mathematician and former math professor who is nowadays famous as the inventor of the wildly successful card game Magic: The Gathering, and many other card and board games. Here is what Wikipedia says about his math background:

After college, he joined Bell Laboratories, but soon after decided to continue his education and attended the University of Pennsylvania, studying combinatorial mathematics for his PhD. Garfield studied under Herbert Wilf and earned a Ph.D. in combinatorial mathematics from Penn in 1993. His thesis was On the Residue Classes of Combinatorial Families of Numbers. Shortly thereafter, he became a professor of mathematics at Whitman College in Walla Walla, Washington.

A colleague of mine who is somewhat knowledgeable about Magic: The Gathering once claimed that the game became as successful as it was because it was invented by a mathematician who systematically set out to create the most addictive game possible. I cannot say how much truth there is to that claim.

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  • $\begingroup$ It is odd that there are 4 magician in the answers!! $\endgroup$
    – C.F.G
    Commented Aug 29, 2020 at 7:00
  • $\begingroup$ Years ago, I visited a Penn math professor who complained that the graduate students were spending all their time in the department lounge playing card games. $\endgroup$
    – Deane Yang
    Commented Nov 25, 2020 at 17:21
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    $\begingroup$ Years ago when I was at Cambridge the graduate students spent their time in the department lounge playing Conway games. $\endgroup$
    – Gerry Myerson
    Commented Nov 25, 2020 at 22:21
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