紀念施堅雅教授

In memory of G. William Skinner, 1923-2008



October 26, 2008
Dear Colleagues,

It is with great sadness that I write to inform. you that G. William Skinner passed away last night.

During the past months, when it became apparent that he would not recover, Bill devoted much of his energy to ensuring that his work would not be lost. He arranged with Bill Lavely for his research on demography to be transferred to the University of Washington. His GIS datasets and related research projects will be given to Harvard, where they will be located in the Spatial Analysis Project at the Fairbank Center. Lex Berman and I, with advice from Mark Henderson and Bill Lavely,
will do our best to see that his materials are preserved and made available to scholars.

The CHGIS project would not have been possible without Bill's support. Even today his application of spatial analysis to the study of Chinese, Japanese, and French society remains among the most sophisticated research in the field. We are all in his debt.

Yours sincerely,
Peter Bol