The L. I. Mandelstam -- R. von Mises correspondence (Q2713239)

The author describes the extant correspondence (27 letters from the physicist Mandelstam, 1879-1944, and 12 from his wife, written in 1918-1937, to Mises, none from Mises) kept at Harvard University, and the cordial relations between the two scholars who first met in 1909 at Strasbourg.NEWLINENEWLINENEWLINEMises influenced Mandelstam both as a Machian and as the originator of the frequentist theory of probability. The author believes that the correspondence was discontinued because of the Great Terror (1936-1938) and notes that in 1927-1928 Mandelstam supervised the work of Boris Hessen (executed in 1937) on the Mises concept of probability.