Errett Bishop - Life

Life

Errett Bishop's father, Albert T Bishop, graduated from the United States Military Academy at West Point, ending his career as professor of mathematics at Wichita State University in Kansas. Although he died when Errett was only 5 years old, he influenced Errett's eventual career by the math texts he left behind, which is how Errett discovered mathematics. Errett grew up in Newton, Kansas. He and his sister were apparent math prodigies.

Bishop entered the University of Chicago in 1944, obtaining both the BS and MS in 1947. The doctoral studies he began in that year were interrupted by two years in the US Army, 1950–52, doing mathematical research at the National Bureau of Standards. He completed his Ph.D. in 1954 under Paul Halmos; his thesis was titled Spectral Theory for Operations on Banach Spaces.

Bishop taught at the University of California, 1954–65. He spent the 1964–65 academic year at the Miller Institute for Basic Research in Berkeley. He was a visiting scholar at the Institute for Advanced Study in 1961-62. From 1965 until his death, he was professor at the University of California at San Diego.