Editing Benoit Mandelbrot (section)

== Early years ==
{{External media |float=right | width=210px |headerimage=[[File:Mandelbrot p1130861.jpg|210px]] | video1=[http://www.webofstories.com/play/benoit.mandelbrot/1;jsessionid=E8EB8E149375B3987E49D5E4F02FCB57 Family background and early education], (4:11) Benoit Mandelbrot interview, Part 1 of 144, [[Web of Stories]]<ref name="wos1">{{cite web |url=http://www.webofstories.com/play/9596 |title=Web of Stories – Benoît Mandelbrot – Family background and early education |last=Mandelbrot |first=Benoît |author2=Bernard Sapoval |author3=Daniel Zajdenweber |date=May 1998 |publisher=[[Web of Stories]] |access-date=19 October 2010 |archive-date=11 September 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110911162528/http://www.webofstories.com/play/9596 |url-status=live }}</ref>}}
'''Benedykt Mandelbrot'''<ref>{{Cite journal | last = Gołąb-Meyer | first = Zofia | title = Benoit Mandelbrot (1924–2010) – ojciec geometrii fraktalnej | url = http://www.foton.if.uj.edu.pl/documents/12579485/8a780912-d415-4ece-8f8c-59b8134ca4a1 | journal = Foton | publisher = Instytut Fizyki Uniwersytetu Jagiellońskiego | volume = 112 | date =Spring 2011 | page = 50 | access-date= 25 December 2021}}</ref> was born in a [[Lithuanian Jews|Lithuanian Jewish]] family, in [[Warsaw]] during the [[Second Polish Republic]].<ref>{{Cite news|last=Hoffman|first=Jascha|date=16 October 2010|title=Benoît Mandelbrot, Novel Mathematician, Dies at 85 (Published 2010)|language=en-US|work=The New York Times|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/17/us/17mandelbrot.html|access-date=20 November 2020|issn=0362-4331|archive-date=21 January 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170121082521/http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/17/us/17mandelbrot.html|url-status=live}}</ref> His father made his living trading clothing; his mother was a dental surgeon. During his first two school years, he was tutored privately by an uncle who despised [[rote learning]]: "Most of my time was spent playing chess, reading maps and learning how to open my eyes to everything around me."<ref name= "wolf">{{cite web |last=Mandelbrot |first=Benoît |title=The Wolf Prizes for Physics, ''A Maverick's Apprenticeship'' |publisher=Imperial College Press |year=2002 |url= http://users.math.yale.edu/~bbm3/web_pdfs/mavericksApprenticeship.pdf |access-date=23 April 2012 |archive-date=3 December 2013 |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20131203024639/http://users.math.yale.edu/~bbm3/web_pdfs/mavericksApprenticeship.pdf |url-status=live }}</ref>

In 1936, when he was 11, the family emigrated from Poland to France. The move, [[World War II]], and the influence of his father's brother, the mathematician [[Szolem Mandelbrojt]] (who had moved to Paris around 1920), further prevented a standard education. "The fact that my parents, as economic and political refugees, joined Szolem in France saved our lives," he writes.<ref name= maverick />{{rp|17}}<ref name="bbc_obit">{{cite news|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-11560101| title= 'Fractal' mathematician Benoît Mandelbrot dies aged 85|date=17 October 2010|work=[[BBC Online]]|access-date=17 October 2010|archive-date=18 October 2010|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20101018045143/http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-11560101|url-status=live}}</ref>

Mandelbrot attended the Lycée Rollin (now the [[Collège-lycée Jacques-Decour]]) in Paris until the start of [[World War II]], when his family moved to [[Tulle]], France. He was helped by [[Rabbi]] [[David Feuerwerker]], the Rabbi of [[Brive-la-Gaillarde]], to continue his studies.<ref name= maverick />{{rp|62–63}}<ref>{{cite book| last= Hemenway| first= P. |year= 2005| title= Divine proportion: Phi in art, nature and science| publisher= Psychology Press |isbn= 0-415-34495-6}}</ref> Much of France was occupied by the Nazis at the time, and Mandelbrot recalls this period:
{{blockquote|Our constant fear was that a sufficiently determined foe might report us to an authority and we would be sent to our deaths. This happened to a close friend from Paris, [[Zina Morhange]], a physician in a nearby county seat. Simply to eliminate the competition, another physician denounced her&nbsp;... We escaped this fate. Who knows why?<ref name= maverick />{{rp|49}}}}

In 1944, Mandelbrot returned to Paris, studied at the [[Lycée du Parc]] in [[Lyon]], and in 1945 to 1947 attended the [[École Polytechnique]], where he studied under [[Gaston Julia]] and [[Paul Lévy (mathematician)|Paul Lévy]]. From 1947 to 1949 he studied at California Institute of Technology, where he earned a master's degree in aeronautics.<ref name="guardian_obit" /> Returning to France, he obtained his [[Doctor of Philosophy|PhD degree]] in Mathematical Sciences at the [[University of Paris]] in 1952.<ref name="wolf" />