Robin John Popplestone (9 December 1938 in Bristol – 14 April 2004 in Glasgow) He received an honours degree in mathematics from Queen's University Belfast in 1960. He started a PhD at the University of Manchester before moving to the University of Leeds. His project was to develop a program for automated theorem proving, but he got caught up in using the university computer to design a boat. Due to illness, he retired in 2001 to the Glasgow area. He died on 14 April 2004 after a 10-year illness with prostate cancer.