Biographical Note
Waldo Tobler was born in 1930. The American-Swiss geographer and cartographer is famous for the "first law of geography," an idea that posits "everything is related to everything else, but near things are more related to each other." He is a leading figure in the development of digital cartography and invented many map projections.
Tobler received his doctorate in geography from the University of Washington at Seattle in 1961. He taught at the University of Michigan from 1961 to 1977. Until his retirement in 1994, he held the positions of Professor of Geography and Professor of Statistics at the University of California, Santa Barbara. The University of Zurich, Switzerland, awarded him an honorary doctorate in 1988.
Tobler has worked on the editorial board of many journals, which included Journal of Regional Science, The American Cartographer, International Journal of Geographical Information and Geographical Analysis. He served as a member of Royal Geographical Society in Great Britain, Regional Science Association and United States National Academy of Sciences. He was the United States delegate to International Geographical Union Commission on Sensing and Data Processing.