Martin Gardner and Calculus Made Easy
Martin often related how he had never taken calculus or any college level mathematics course, or indeed any mathematics after leaving high school in 1932. Yet, in the 21st century, in a review of one of his books in the Journal of Recreational Mathematics, it was remarked that "Gardner will go down in history as one of the most significant mathematicians of all time." Along the way, he'd made up for lost time.
Late in life, Martin returned to a subject he'd never quite mastered, namely calculus, by authoring an update of the relatively forgotten Calculus Made Easy (St. Martin's, 1998, 336 pages), originally published in 1910 by Sylvanus P. Thompson.
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