Editing Kristen Nygaard (section)

==Early life and career==
Nygaard was born in Oslo and received his master's degree in mathematics at the [[University of Oslo]] in 1956. His thesis on abstract probability theory was entitled "Theoretical Aspects of [[Monte Carlo method]]s".

Nygaard worked full-time at the [[Norwegian Defense Research Establishment]] from 1948 to 1960, in [[computing]] and programming (1948–1954) and [[operational research]] (1952–1960).

From 1957 to 1960, he was head of the first [[operations research]] groups in the Norwegian defense establishment. He was cofounder and first chairman of the Norwegian Operational Research Society (1959–1964). In 1960, he was hired by the [[Norwegian Computing Center]] (NCC), responsible for building up the NCC as a research institute in the 1960s, becoming its Director of Research in 1962.