TIMS President, 1992-93
Paul Gray was the 39th President of TIMS. Prior to his passing he was Professor Emeritus and Founding Chair of Information Science at Claremont Graduate University. He specialized in information systems, particularly decision support systems, knowledge management, and business intelligence.
It was during his term as TIMS president that the merger committee, chaired by John D. C. Little, completed the concept of INFORMS and took the initial steps to unite TIMS and ORSA. Gray enthusiastically supported the merger. He served a total of 13 years on the TIMS and ORSA councils: four as secretary of TIMS, three as Vice President at Large of TIMS, three as member of the ORSA Council, and three as President-Elect, President and Past President of TIMS. Starting in 1969 when he was editor of the Bulletin of ORSA, he also served in many capacities including as committee chair, committee member, and editorial board member for the two societies. He was co-Departmental Editor for Public Sector Applications of Management Science for seven years.
He was awarded the Kimball Medal in 2002. He is an inaugural INFORMS Fellow, an inaugural Fellow of the Association for Information Systems, and was awarded the LEO Award for lifetime achievement by the Association for Information Systems in 2002. He was President of Omega Rho (1988-90) the international operations research honor society. From 2006 through 2011 he served as Series Editor of the annual TutORials in Operations Research volumes published by INFORMS. He chaired the INFORMS History and Traditions Committee.
Gray’s research spans operations research and information systems. He is known for three first papers: crime in transportation, telecommuting, and group decision support systems. He is the author of over 150 published papers and author/editor of 14 books.
Before arriving at Claremont Graduate University in 1983, he was a professor at Stanford University, the Georgia Institute of Technology, the University of Southern California, and Southern Methodist University. He was a professor for over 30 years and served as department chair for 15 of those years. Prior to his academic career, he worked for 16 years in research and development organizations including nine years at SRI International.
Prof. Gray retired in 2001 but continued to teach, do research, consult, and serve as curator of the Paul Gray PC museum at Claremont Graduate University.
His academic achievements included the following degrees: AB (Mathematics), 1950, NYU; MS (Mathematics), 1954, Michigan; MS (Electrical Engineering), 1962, Purdue; and PhD (Operations Research) 1968, Stanford.