Pitman's parents, emigrating from England, met on the ship to Australia. He was educated at Melbourne U, graduating with an MA in mathematics in 1923 after his studies had been interrupted by two years of war service. Pitman was Professor of Mathematics at U Tasmania from 1926 to 1962. An early task there was to lecture in Statistics—a subject new to him. His subsequent research concerned the foundations of statistical inference including pioneering work on non-parametric tests. He was President of the Australian Mathematical Society in 1958. In 1978 the SSAI instituted the award of the Pitman Medal for ‘high distinction in statistics’: Pitman himself was the first recipient. See Appendix XI: Honours and Awards for list of winners

http://science.org.au/fellows/memoirs/pitman.html Fuller biography and photograph.