Dr. Frank Stenger

Dr. Frank Stenger passed away peacefully surrounded by family on October 23rd, 2024 at the University of Utah medical center. He was 86 years old. Frank was preceded in death by his sister Katherine, son in-law Kory and former wife Yvonne.

Frank is survived by wife Carol, brothers George(Marge), Ed(Joyce), sons Martin(Jonna), Greg(Dana), daughters Lisa, Shannon(Kory), grandchildren Jarhad(Stacy), Chelsey(Brian), Saige, Keaton (Bree), Malik (Annika), greatgrandchildren Kyson, Aria, Lily, Dorothy, Rinley and Kiaan as well as extended family Gordon, Kathy and “Big Brother” Mentor Teacher Ervan Stobbe (Selma).

Frank Stenger was a delightful man. He had a jovial, curious, intellectual and introspective manner about him.  Frank had an interesting, remarkable and significant life, which began in the middle of 1938 in Magyarpolany, Hungary. Magyarpolany was originally a German speaking village established along the Danube River, commissioned by the queen of Austro-Hungary in the 1700’s with purpose to rebuild the fertile lands after decades of war. Settlers mostly consisted of the ethnic Germanic people who became known as Danube Swabians. After WW2, the Swabians were expelled from Hungary based on their ethnicity as a supposed threat to the Magyar regime. The Stenger’s, a family of 4, were stripped of their ancestral lands of 5 generations and shipped off with minimal possessions to East Germany. A harsh sort of gratitude to Frank’s father George in terms of serving his country in the Hungarian Army fighting mostly Russians (another story).  There they spent a year of hardship in poverty with food rationing, living around desperate people. They managed to escape to West Germany (another story) and spent a year there. Although free in West Germany, his father George experienced prejudice and disrespect working as a tradesman. They found out about Canada’s Homestead Act, applied and were accepted. After lengthy boat and train rides sponsored by relatives already in Canada from their home town in Hungary, they found their way to their homestead property in southwestern Alberta. A simple shack of a home was built, then clearing the fields of rocks and dry farming. The first 3 years the crops failed, ruined by drought or hail. Later there was success and a larger house was built and upgraded with the times. However, the Stenger family survived these hard early years in Canada by the kindness and generosity of their neighbors and relatives. These arduous experiences shaped Frank into a very hardworking, motivated, kind, generous and respectful person. In high school he excelled in both academics and athletics. He was awarded best all-around athlete both his Jr and Sr. year, and is on the wall of fame in Warburg High School. He was accepted into the University of Alberta on an academic scholarship. He earned his engineering degree and at the same time discovered his passion for mathematics. Around that time he was about 22, met a 19 year old Yvonne Hebert, courted for a few months and got married. He went on to earn his Master’s (Electrical Engineering) and PhD (Mathematics) degrees from University of Alberta. During that time Lisa arrived and Martin a few years later. Frank found a teaching position at University of Michigan and three years after landed a position as professor which later became tenured at the University of Utah.

A decade or so later during a sabbatical at University of British Columbia, Frank and Yvonne, who’s relationship had become tumultuous, finally split up and the family of four became two pairs. Martin went with Frank back to Utah and soon after became US Citizens. Lisa and Yvonne stayed in Canada.

Back in Salt Lake City, Utah in the late 1970’s, Frank heard about a social group called Parents without Partners and decided to attend a meeting. Carol was the first person he met there, as she was the publicity director. He was immediately charmed and didn’t feel like he needed to meet any other gals from that time forward. As a testament to his interest, their first date conflicted with Martin’s hockey game.  Frank uncharacteristically found a way for someone else to take him. Frank and Carol dated a few months and fell in love, 100% accepted each other’s kids as their own, got married and spent the rest of Frank’s life 46+ years together, a wonderful and loving partnership. There were stipulations on both sides; Frank agreed to give Carol at least 40 years and not ride a motorcycle, Carol agreed to co-host parties. Financially Carol bought the food with a house full of teenagers, and Frank covered the ‘rent’ during those times.  The stipulations were all met. Notably Frank and Carol hosted a ton of parties! There were monthly graduate student parties, parties for visiting colleagues, 4^th and 24^th of July, graduations, holiday parties and even hosted a wedding (Shannon and Kory) at their place in the avenues. Other than being gracious hosts, Frank was an excellent chef and would typically make a massive batch of yummy stew of either Hungarian Goulash, Paprikas or a Cajun Gumbo that could feed 50 or so folks. For holiday meals he loved to cook a goose, duck or leg of lamb.

Frank had many interests and passions outside of academics and cooking. He loved to take a bath, he would spend hours in the tub. He loved to hear music from the Kinston Trio, Nana Mouskouri, Johnny Cash and Johan Strauss – whom he identified with for being Swabian. He also enjoyed playing the harmonica, which he claimed was from his Gypsy roots. Frank loved emerging technology and always seem to find the latest gadgets be it cameras, calculators, watches, computers, cell phones and accoutrements. He loved his tools, hand and power. He had a penchant for fancy writing instruments. He loved biking and bicycles, skiing, hiking, ice skating and hockey. During his career he commuted with his bicycle on nice days. He loved his dogs Sinca, Mac, Chester and Zeta immensely and often fed them first at the dinner table. He loved meeting people and would treat his guests like family.

Frank Stenger’s genius and contributions to Mathematics and Computer Science are significant and substantial. He published over 250 technical papers and over a 1/2 dozen text books mostly related to science and engineering, from which he has received thousands of referrals. Some of his honors include a Distinguished Research Award in 1997 from the University of Utah, and being identified by SIAM as one of a few who contributed most to numerical analysis in the 20th century. After he retired from the University, his passion for mathematics kept going – just a list a few items; he solved the famous Riemann Hypotheses (proposed in 1870) in and took it to another level, wrote a couple text books, worked on military contracts and referee works.  A more detailed and comprehensive list of Frank’s work can be found via links below.

His main research into developing Sinc Methods, which have massive applications yet are challenging to understand and have yet been fully reach their potential to overhaul computational software functionality and increase efficiency. In layman’s terms, computer hardware keep getting faster mostly because software keeps getting larger. Note the annual rate of speed increase of hardware is now generally overwhelmed by the rate of computational software bloating. Sinc methods can level this disparity. Typical replacement of legacy code with Sinc function code results in orders of magnitude more accuracy and similar orders of magnitude fewer lines of code. As Sinc Methods are taught at some university’s now they will in time become better understood and utilized.

We love and miss Frank dearly and honor his accomplishments, kindness, generosity and compassion along with his eccentricity’s and old world ways.

For a full list of academic achievements, please see the following:

University of Utah School of Computing Dedication: https://www.cs.utah.edu/112603-2/

Frank’s Emeritus web page: https://users.cs.utah.edu/~stenger/

Frank’s QR code webpage: https://monumark.com/monumarks/?tag=51576

Frank was not a fan of cut flowers, thus in lieu if which or otherwise if anyone feeling philanthropic, donations to grow a scholarship can be made to the following two Universities in his name:

The Dr. Frank Stenger Memorial Fund at the University of Alberta that can grow from a general to a specific scholarship with their Department of Mathematics and Statistical Sciences. uabgive.ca/tribute

The University of Utah School of Computing Scholarship Fund. www.price.utah.edu/frank-stenger

A Celebration of Life for Frank Stenger will be on November 23, 2024 from 11am-1pm at Starks Funeral Parlor, 3651 South 900 East, Salt Lake City, Utah 84106. Guests are encouraged to use parking and entrance located on the north side of the building.