Françoise Aron Ulam
Françoise Aron Ulam was the wife of Polish-American mathematician, Stanislaw Ulam. Born March 8, 1918, in Paris, France, the daughter of Daniel Pierre Aron and Madeleine. In 1939, she came to the United States as an exchange student. She studied at Mills College and Mount Holyoke College, earning a Master's degree in Comparative Literature.
In 1941 she met and married Stanislaw Ulam. In 1943, the Ulams moved from Los Alamos to Santa Fe following Stanislaw's involvement in the Manhattan Project in Los Alamos at its inception.
In Los Alamos, Francoise became part of the international community of scientists and mathematicians during the Atomic Age. Like many of the Manhattan Project wives, initially she knew very little about the purpose of the "Gadget," as the bomb was known at the time. She devoted herself to creating a home and raising a baby in the American Southwest, developing a taste for computers, yoga and feldenkrais.
In 1984, when her husband died, Françoise arranged for Santa Fe Institute to receive Stanislaw Ulam's library.
On April 30, 2011, Françoise died at the El Castillo retirement community in Santa Fe, New Mexico, aged 93. Françoise was buried in Paris.Books
- Ulam, Françoise. Analogies Between Analogies: The Mathematical Reports of S.M. Ulam and his Los Alamos Collaborators . 1990.
- Ulam, Françoise. De Paris a Los Alamos, Une odyssée franco-americaine .
- Ulam, Stanislaw. Adventures of a Mathematician. 1976.
