Richard “Rich” Johnson

Dr. Richard Arnold “Rich” Johnson, age 88 of Madison, USA, died on February 2, 2026. He lived a rich life of service and countless contributions to the field and profession of statistics.

Rich was born on July 10, 1937, in St. Paul, Minnesota. He obtained three degrees from the University of Minnesota: a BEE, MS in Mathematics, and PhD in Statistics. He joined the University of Wisconsin–Madison Statistics faculty in 1966, where he remained as a tenured professor until his retirement in 2008.

During his 42 years on the faculty at the University of Wisconsin, he served for three years as the Statistics Department Chair.

Rich published over 125 technical papers in such internationally acclaimed journals as the Annals of Mathematical Statistics, the Annals of Statistics, the Journal of the American Statistical Society and Technometrics.

His papers span a wide range of topics marked by contributions to asymptotic theory, rank tests, circular statistics, multivariate statistics and reliability. His work on applications of statistics in forestry was invaluable. He especially enjoyed his creative collaborations with Gouri Bhattacharyya, and those with George Roussas.

Rich co-authored six textbooks. The best known is the highly cited Applied Multivariate Statistical Analysis, with Dean Wichern. This book is now in its sixth edition and is used throughout the world. His other highly circulated timely published text on Statistics: Principles and Methods, with G. K. Bhattacharyya, is in the eighth edition. He was the sole revisor of Probability and Statistics for Engineers, by I. Miller and J. Freund, for the fourth through seventh editions.

Rich was a recipient of several honors and awards. He was an Elected Fellow of the American Statistical Association (ASA), the International Statistics Institute and the Institute of Mathematical Statistics (IMS). He was awarded the IMS Carver Medal in 2008 for “exemplary service and patient wisdom in the creative administration and guidance of IMS programs in different roles over two decades,” and the Don Owen award for his service to the ASA in 2009. At his retirement conference, Rich was presented an award by James Evans, United States Forest Products Laboratory, which read, “For 30 years of collaborative research leading to advances in statistical methodology that significantly enhanced the Forest Products Laboratory’s research effort.” His paper with Chris Morrell on “Random truncation and neutrinos” was awarded the Frank Wilcoxon Award for the best applications paper in Technometrics, 1991.

His service to profession included his having been an IMS Associate Program Secretary, Program Secretary and member of the Executive Committee. He was also on the editorial board of the Journal of American Statistical Association and was a member of the ASA Council.

One of his major contributions to the statistical profession was the very timely creation of the international journal Statistics and Probability Letters. He was the founding editor of this journal and served as its Editor-in-Chief for 25 years, from 1982–2007. This journal is well regarded worldwide and has been credited by some for helping change the culture of statistics journals towards faster response times. It is now in its 44th year and still going strong. I had an opportunity of being Co-editor-in-Chief of this journal for six years, 2007–13.

Professor Richard Johnson was an unofficial ambassador for statistics, giving technical talks in 23 foreign countries and meeting with statisticians worldwide. He and his wife Bobbie enjoyed these journeys together, building lifelong friendships from the Far East to Europe to Africa. In retirement they traveled widely as tourists.

He was also especially proud of the 25 PhD students he advised during his tenure from all over the globe. During his professional career he mentored numerous national and international scholars with an impact. I was fortunate to befriend him in June 1968 and benefit in all these years from his friendship, mentorship and scholarly advice. He will be missed immensely.

—

Written by Hira L Koul, Michigan State University

Rich Johnson was the subject of a profile, written by Kjell Doksum and Kam Tsui, on the occasion of his selection to receive the IMS Harry C. Carver Award in 2008. You can read it on page 4 of the August/September 2008 issue of the IMS Bulletin.