George Airy was born in Alnwick, Northumberland England on July 27, 1801. He was educated at Cambridge University, graduating at the head of his class in 1823. Airy's rise in academia was meteoric. He was appointed Lucasian Professor at Cambridge in 1826 and was appointed Plumian Professor of Astronomy and Director of the Cambridge Observatory in 1828. Airy was England's Royal Astronomer from 1835 to 1881.
Airy made significant contributions in mathematics, astronomy, and optics He is important in the development of statistics because of his seminal work on a theory of errors, which was published in his book On the Algebraic and Numerical Theory of Errors of Observations and the Combination of Observations.
Airy was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1836 and was elected president of the society in 1851. He was elected president of the British Association in 1871. Airy received the Copley Medal from the Royal Society in 1831 and the Royal Medal in 1845. Airy died on January 2, 1892 in Greenwich, England.