ACTUARIES AND ACTUARIAL SCIENCE

May I begin by giving you some brief recollections of my earliest connexions with the Institute of Actuaries and its members. About forty years ago, during a short stay in London, I went to see Ralph Todhunter, who was then Editor of the Journal of the Institute.
 
When I told him that I was interested in statistical theory, he sent me on to William Elderton. Elderton received me with his usual kindness, and this was the beginning of a lifelong friendship. I am happy and proud to have been a friend of this great actuary and distinguished personality, whom I am sure that We all deeply miss today.
 
Some years afterwards, in 1927, I went to the International Actuarial Congress in London. In the course of a conversation with one of the older members of the Institute, I may have stressed my youthful theoretical interests a little too much, because he remarked: ‘In this country, we look upon an actuary as of no value if he is not a practical business man.’ I certainly felt that I lacked something in this respect, and did my best to improve. It is possible that I succeeded, at least superficially, as the following little incident may show.

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