Deborah Tepper Haimo was born in Odessa, Ukraine, raised in Israel, and came
to the
United States when she was 11 years old. She was an undergraduate at
Radcliffe College
and a graduate student at Harvard. At the latter institution she studied
with Hassler Whitney.
She wrote her thesis, "Integral equations associated with Hankel
transforms", under the
direction of David Widder.
Haimo taught at Washington University in St. Louis and Southern Illinois University before she was hired by the fledgeling University of Missouri in St. Louis Mathematics Department. She twice served as Chair there, and helped to build the department to its current position of strength.
Haimo served as a member of the Board of Trustees of Radcliffe College and also on the Board of Overseers of Harvard University. She was noted for her service to the profession and for the professional encouragement and nurturing of women mathematicians, and was in 1997 awarded the Yueh-Gin Gung and Dr. Charles Y. Hu Award of the MAA for Distinguished Service.
Haimo, and her late husband Franklin, are also remembered for the important Deborah and Franklin Tepper Haimo Award of the MAA for the recognition of distinguished teaching service.
Haimo died at the age of 85. She is survived by four daughters.