Professor Alexander (Alex) D. D. Craik: 1938–2019

Alex Craik died peacefully at his home in St Andrews on Sunday 17 November 2019.

Alex was born in Brechin where his father ran a small draper’s shop. He attended Brechin High School where he gained a reputation as an outstanding scholar as well as a cricketer. In 1956, he was awarded a top Harkness Bursary, and he went to the University of St Andrews and commenced studying Mathematics. He graduated in 1960 with a first-class degree.

He moved to Cambridge, where he was one of the first research students at the recently founded Churchill College, and obtained a PhD in fluid dynamics under the guidance of T. Brooke Benjamin. But he did not stay south of the border for long: in 1963 he was appointed a lecturer in Applied Mathematics at St Andrews, where he worked until his retirement forty years later.

Alex’s research in fluid dynamics was outstanding. In particular, he was an expert on wave motion and hydrodynamic stability and he liked to construct ingenious theoretical models to explain observed physical phenomena. An ongoing interest was the effects of wind blowing across a water surface. He wrote over 70 research papers, several of which were cited hundreds of times. In 1985, he published the book Wave Interactions and Fluid Flows which became a seminal text in the area. Although many of his papers were single-authored he could be an effective collaborator. He particularly enjoyed regular visits to Japan, when his wife Elizabeth was Professor of Classics at Kyoto University, to work with leading fluid dynamicists, especially Hisashi Okamoto.

Alex was respected by staff and students as a fine lecturer and a thoughtful, supportive and very modest colleague. In 1983, he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, in 1987 he was awarded a Personal Chair at St Andrews and from 1993 to 1995 he was President of the Edinburgh Mathematical Society.

As Alex neared retirement he became increasingly interested in the history of mathematics, focussing both on fluid dynamics and on little-known Scottish mathematicians of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. His careful analysis of hitherto undiscovered sources raised the profile of mathematicians such as William Spence, George Sinclair and Edward Sang, and of Scottish mathematics in general. This work continued for the rest of his life and, with over 30 papers on the history of mathematics, he gained a high reputation as immensely knowledgeable and a fine historical scholar. His book Mr Hopkins’ Men, published in 2007, is a meticulously researched but very readable account of the influence of Cambridge on British mathematics in the nineteenth century. The book is written around the Cambridge mathematics undergraduates coached by William Hopkins, many of whom, such as Arthur Cayley, George Stokes and Peter Guthrie Tait, went on to become leading and influential mathematicians.

Alex promoted the history of mathematics both through his encouragement of the nascent MacTutor history of mathematics archive at St Andrews, started by his colleagues Edmund Robertson and John O’Connor, and through his support for the BSHM. He was a long-standing member of the Society (pre-dating our computer records). Although he felt that distance precluded him serving on Council, he was a regular participant or speaker at BSHM meetings, often travelling down to Birmingham, Oxford, or London to attend. Since I joined St Andrews University, I have come very much to rely on Alex's quiet, but exceptionally well-informed, support and sound judgement – as well as on the fine scholarly works that remain an inspiration to me and a number of my students.

Alex retained his interest in, and enthusiasm for, the history of mathematics to the end, with two papers still in press in the BJHM on his death (one appeared in the last issue; the last is in this issue). He is survived by his wife, Elizabeth, who is an Honorary Professor of Classics at St Andrews, and by their son and daughter.