Thomas Brooke Benjamin

Born: April 15, 1929, Wallasey, United Kingdom

Died: August 16, 1995, Oxford, United Kingdom
Education: University of Liverpool, University of Cambridge, King's College, Cambridge, Yale
University
Thomas Brooke Benjamin, FRS was an English mathematical physicist and mathematician, best
known for his work in mathematical analysis and fluid mechanics (Fluid mechanics is the
branch of physics that studies fluids (liquids, gases, and plasmas) and the forces on them. Fluid
mechanics can be divided into fluid statics, the study of fluids at rest; fluid kinematics, the study
of fluids in motion; and fluid dynamics, the study of the effect of forces on fluid motion.,
especially in applications of nonlinear differential equations. Benjamin was awarded a doctorate
degree at King's College, Cambridge in 1955 and appointed Assistant Director of Research
1958-1967 and Reader in Hydrodynamics 1967-1970, working in the Department of Applied
Mathematics and Theoretical Physics, Cambridge University, on problems of fluid dynamics
such as thin films, wave instability, drag reduction, and vortex breakdown. He was elected
Fellow of the Royal Society in 1966, at the early age of 36.
In 1970 Benjamin moved as Professor of Mathematics to the University of Essex, where he set
up the Fluid Mechanics Research Institute, to promote interaction between mathematicians and
experimentalists in advanced fluid mechanics. In 1979 he accepted appointment to the Sedleian
Chair of Natural Philosophy at Oxford, which carried with it Fellowship of The Queen's College.
Apart from periods as visiting professor at overseas universities, principally in America,
Benjamin remained in Oxford until his death on 16 August 1995.
In addition to his contributions to the study of fluid dynamics, Benjamin retained a lifelong
interest in music, as executant (piano and strings), conductor and composer. Somewhat later in
life, he also turned to the composition of poetry.
Benjamin was twice married: in 1956 to Helen Ginsburg, by whom he had a son and two
daughters; the marriage was dissolved in 1974. In 1978 he married Natalia Court, by whom he
had a daughter.
I think Benjamin would be a very good figure to make a movie about him, because he was a
prestigious person, specializing mathematical physicist and fluid mechanics. Benjamin was
modest, and always polite. Among his colleagues he inspired great admiration, affection, and
loyalty. He was inwardly sensitive and imaginative? He was justifiably proud that despite taking
a leading part in many activities he made no known enemies. The movie that could made from
fluid mechanics is SQUIRM 2 because in the first movie the worms came out of shower heads,
and I think it would scarier for them to come out with lots of blood from people that they already
killed.