Emeritus Professor Martin H. Krieger, a polymath whose interests ranged from the hard sciences to the humanities, and who was among the most beloved and admired members of the USC Price School of Public Policy’s faculty, has died. He was 80.
Krieger joined the USC Price School in 1984 as a visiting lecturer and was hired as an associate professor of Urban and Regional Planning and was promoted to professor a year later. He retired in 2020.
“Martin was one of the most brilliant and unique people I’ve ever met,” said Genevieve Giuliano, interim dean of the USC Price School. “He had incredible insight and a range of interests that knew no bounds. He was also an iconoclast.”
“As devoted as he was to his craft, he was more devoted to his son, whom he introduced to the planning community in the baby stroller at a national conference long before such things were done.”
At the time of his retirement, he was focused on defense and military policy and on uncertainty and ambiguity. But his research touched on numerous other fields including urban planning and design theory, ethics and entrepreneurship, and the role of humanities in planning. A scientist who embraced the arts, he photographed storefront houses of worship and industrial sites in Los Angeles.
He published at least a dozen books on topics as diverse as Constitutions of Matter: Mathematically Modeling the Most Everyday of Physical Phenomena to What’s Wrong with Plastic Trees?: Artifice and Authenticity in Design. His urban tomography photographs and sound recordings are archived in USC’s Special Collections Library and in the Krieger Collection in the USC Digital Library.
“Martin was an amazingly inventive and creative scholar who was constantly trying to better understand planning and urban theory from multiple perspectives,” said Professor David C. Sloane, chair of the Department of Urban Planning and Spatial Analysis. “He was never satisfied with being in one part of the field, moving from visual studies to mathematical concerns, design considerations to entrepreneurial practices. He also was a wonderful teacher, inventing a series of new courses that pushed our curriculum in new and fascinating ways. He educated us all so much.”
Martin was one of the most brilliant and unique people I’ve ever met.
USC Price School Interim Dean Genevieve Giuliano
Krieger earned a B.A., M.A., and a Ph.D. in physics from Columbia University, enabling him to apply scientific rigor to numerous other fields.
Mathematical models of cities were one of his primary interests.
“I’m concerned with the ideas that are built into the models, and often understanding the models means understanding the mathematics or the physics well enough to see what’s buried underneath,” he said during an interview in 2016.
“Social science always makes claims how the mathematics shows this, or the model shows that, and often it’s a dubious enterprise,” he added. “My work is sort of prophylactic; clean up the nonsense and give very good ideas.”
His Renaissance approach to life was reflected in his fellowships, which included those at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences, the National Humanities Center and the American Physical Society.
Along with his intellect, Krieger will be remembered for his kindness, humor and mentoring – not just for students but his colleagues. Three of his books offered practical advice on forging successful careers in academia that were aimed at PhD students and faculty. He won three consecutive USC Mentoring Awards for mentoring undergraduates, graduate students and faculty.
“I like it when students go out into the world and do good things,” Krieger said during his 2016 interview. “I get notes from them, you know, ‘here’s what I’m doing.’ That’s an enormous pleasure.”
Meredith Drake Reitan, a former graduate student at the USC Price School, noted that, “classes with Martin could be intense, as he actively challenged students to see things differently. We shared a passion for Charles Marville, who photographed the streets of Paris in the 19th century, and over the years, we often talked about the unexpected details of everyday life that Marville captured. Martin brought that same deep humanism to his own photography.”
Krieger taught at several other universities, including UC Berkeley and MIT, before joining the USC Price School, but it was here that he found his home.
“This is a place where I can do lots of good.”
At the request of his family, donations can be made in Krieger’s name to the Exceptional Children’s Foundation.
