Today is the birthday of George Fix (May 10, 1939-March 10, 2002). Fix was primarily a mathematician “who collaborated on several seminal papers and books in the field of finite element method. For my purposes, he’s much more well know in the beer community as “a beer and homebrewing enthusiast and educator, as well as the author of several books about brewing. He died of cancer in 2002.”

Here’s the beer part of his Wikipedia entry:

Fix also applied his talents to amateur beer brewing. He won hundreds of awards across the United States for his beers, and was named Homebrewer of the Year in 1981 by the American Homebrewers Association (AHA). He was a consultant to numerous microbreweries and brewpubs, and served as an expert witness in brewing-related litigation. He served on the Board of Advisors of the AHA, the editorial board of Brewing Techniques magazine, the steering committee of the Masters Championship of Amateur Brewing, and was a member of Beer Judge Certification Program, the American Association of Brewing Chemists, and the Master Brewers Association of America. In 1999, he wrote Principles of Brewing Science, considered a standard reference for home- and craft-brewers. He also co-authored two books about homebrewing with his wife Laurie, including An Analysis of Brewing Techniques in 1998.

For his achievements and role as an educator in the field of home brewing, Fix was honoured with the AHA Recognition Award in 1991, the Distinguished Service Recognition Award by the Association of Brewers in 1991, and the Ninkasi Award by the AHA in 1997.

He wrote three books that I know of on beer, An Analysis of Brewing Techniques (1998), Principles of Brewing Science: A Study of Serious Brewing Issues (1999), and Vienna, Märzen, Oktoberfest, number 4 in the Classic Beer Style Series (1998).

Here’s his biography from the Brewers Publications.

The late George Fix will be remembered as a pioneer in finite element methods, phase field methods and for numerous other contributions to numerical analysis and applied mathematics. He also distinguished himself as the chairman of three mathematics departments.

George had a second concurrent and distinguished career as a practitioner and scientist in the brewing of beer. He was named Homebrewer of the Year in 1981 by the American Homebrewers Association. He wrote two books with his wife, Laurie, An Analysis of Brewing Techniques and Vienna, Märzen, and Oktoberfest.

In addition, he authored a scientific treatise titled Principles of Brewing Science, which has gone through two editions. He was awarded the Distinguished Service Recognition Award by the Association of Brewers in 1991 and the Ninkasi award by the AHA in 1997, the highest honors bestowed by these organizations at the time.