Oscar Zariski was a Russian-born American mathematician and one of the most influential algebraic geometers of the 20th century. Zariski was born on April 24, 1899 in Kobrin, Russian Empire to a Jewish family. His parents were Bezalel Zaritsky and Hanna Tennenbaum and in 1918 studied at the University of Kiev. He left Kiev in 1920 to study in Rome where he became a disciple of the Italian school of algebraic geometry, studying with Guido Castelnuovo, Federigo Enriques and Francesco Severi. He received the National Medal Of Science in 1965. He died on July 4, 1986 (aged 87) in Brookline, Massachusetts.