Lester Robert Frankel was a prominent American survey statistician

Statistical survey

Survey methodology is the field that studies surveys, that is, the sample of individuals from a population with a view towards making statistical inferences about the population using the sample. Polls about public opinion, such as political beliefs, are reported in the news media in democracies....

. He studied under Harold Hotelling

Harold Hotelling

Harold Hotelling was a mathematical statistician and an influential economic theorist.He was Associate Professor of Mathematics at Stanford University from 1927 until 1931, a member of the faculty of Columbia University from 1931 until 1946, and a Professor of Mathematical Statistics at the...

, receiving a master's degree from Columbia University

Columbia University

Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...

 in 1936, and served as the 70th president of the American Statistical Association

President of the American Statistical Association

The President of the American Statistical Association is the head of the American Statistical Association . According to the association's bylaws, the president is an officer, and a member of the board of directors and of the executive committee. Elections for the position are held annually, in...

 in 1975. He was also president of the Market Research Council, and received awards for distinguished service from that organization and the American Association for Public Opinion Research.

Frankel helped develop one of the first unemployment measures and conduct one of the first federal surveys of unemployment (1940). After this was taken over by the U.S. Census Bureau, it became known as the Current Population Survey

Current Population Survey

The Current Population Survey is a statistical survey conducted by the United States Census Bureau for the Bureau of Labor Statistics . The BLS uses the data to provide a monthly report on the Employment Situation. This report provides estimates of the number of unemployed people in the United...

. Frankel served in the navy from 1944 to 1946. He later worked for Dun & Bradstreet

Dun & Bradstreet

Dun & Bradstreet is a Fortune 500 public company headquartered in Short Hills, New Jersey, USA that provides information on businesses and corporations for use in credit decisions, B2B marketing and supply chain management...

, Alfred Politz Research, and Audits & Surveys Worldwide.

He died after a stroke at the age of 92.