Francesco Altomare - the remarkable mathematician and human being

We laconically describe the great contributions of Professor Francesco Altomare to mathematical research and PhD education, and his unique status in the mathematical community. In particular, we present and give examples of his innovative and great achievements related to the following areas of mathematics: Functional Analysis, Operator Theory, Potential Theory, Approximation Theory, Probability Theory, Function Spaces, Choquet's Theory, Dirichlet's Problem and Semigroup Theory. Moreover, we report on and give concrete examples of his unique way to work together with PhD students, both before and sometimes also after their dissertation. Finally, we shortly describe his remarkable “class travel” from “simple” conditions with no academic traditions in his family in the small hometown Giovinazzo to finally become the broad, ingenious, and powerful mathematician he is regarded to be today.