The ASA History of Statistics IG and CHANCE magazine are sponsoring a webinar by Penny Reynolds. All are welcome, so please feel free to share. Details are below.
Title: Betty Allan: Applied Statistician, "Real" Statistician
Speaker: Penny S. Reynolds
Sponsors: ASA History of Statistics Interest Group and CHANCE magazine
Date & Time
Dec 11, 2025 03:00 PM in Eastern Time (US and Canada)
Registration
https://amstat.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_tyNTCV0dQCqK0IlXfrrcFw#/registration
Description
Frances Elizabeth "Betty" Allan (1905–1952) was the first professional consulting statistician in Australia (and possibly the English-speaking world). She was a prize-winning mathematics student at the University of Melbourne at a time when women mathematicians were objects of ridicule. As a scholarship student at Cambridge and Rothamsted she received world class training in theoretical and applied statistics under G. Udny Yule and Sir Ronald Fisher. At Rothamsted, she contributed to theoretical developments in correlation, orthogonal polynomials, and missing data estimation. After her return to Australia, she worked for the next ten years at the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR, now CSIRO) as a statistical consultant, introducing modern statistical design and analysis methods to agriculture and forestry research. The government marriage bar forced her mandatory resignation in 1940, aged only 35. She continued to teach theoretical and applied statistics until her early death in 1952 at the age of 47. Although she produced little in the way of novel statistical work, produced few scholarly publications, and lacked professional recognition during her tenure, the importance of Allan's contributions to Australian research has now been recognized. Nevertheless, Allan's career exemplifies still current difficulties faced by applied statisticians in establishing professional legitimacy and recognition as collaborating scientists rather than "number crunchers."
Speaker Bio: Dr. Reynolds obtained her PhD in Zoology & Statistics from the University of Wisconsin-Madison USA. She has recently retired as applied statistician in the College of Medicine and College of Veterinary Medicine, University of Florida, and is now a freelance writer specializing in experimental design and the history of statistics. She is a member of both the American Statistical Association and the Royal Statistical Society History of Statistics sections. She has contributed several articles on unknown statistical pioneers for both Chance and Significance, has a monthly column This Month in Statistics History for AmStat News, and a daily Bluesky miniblog@hos-asa.bsky.social.
------------------------------
Wendy Martinez
Pronouns: she, they
Senior Mathematical Statistician for Data Science
US Census Bureau
------------------------------