Lef · Pontryagin
Lef · Semyonovic · Pontryaggin (Лев Семёнович Понтрягин, September 3, 1908 - May 3, 1988) is a mathematician of Russia. Born in Moscow before the Russian Revolution, he left this world just before the collapse of the Soviet Union. His family was very poor and could not even go to a cheap experimental school with a crescent moon and received the first education at a four-year elementary school. An explosion accident caused blindness at the age of 14. It is said that he was able to become a mathematician because there was a devoted effort of the mother. ...