Irwin Jacob Hoffman was born February 5, 1932. His father, Morris (6/12/1907–1/30/1990), was a high school mathematics teacher. His mother, Margaret (née Goldfarb, 5/22/06–9/10/87), is buried at Mt. Nebo Cemetery, Aurora, CO. His family were observant Jews, who belonged to Beth Hamedrosh Hagodol congregation. At certain clubs and companies, Jews were not welcome, so they formed their own country clubs. Jews socialized with Jews.

Irwin and his brother Nathan (1933–2008) attended BMH Religious School and learned Hebrew. They would each have been Bar Mitzvah at age 13. Irwin was one of the officers in the Junior Congregation in 1948. The Religious School had a library. The junior congregation had its own Sabbath service.

At Gove Junior High School, Irwin ran an “Abacus” project. The study developed the abacus as a motivating agency for skills in arithmetic and as the basis for more thorough understanding of our number system. It was submitted for publication, but was not published.

He attended East High School from 1947 until 1949, where his father taught mathematics. East High School had many Jews.

Irwin went to the University of Denver on a tennis scholarship, where he played on the varsity team. He was one of eighteen seniors elected to Phi Beta Kappa, the national honorary scholastic fraternity. He belonged to Omicron Delta Kappa, a national senior men’s honorary fraternity. He also was a member of Pi Mu Epsilon, an upper honorary math frat; Pi Delta Theta, an honorary lower-division math organization; Delta Chi, chemistry society; Phi Delta Kappa, an honorary national educational society; and the Arnold Air Society, the Air Force honorary society. He graduated with a major in math and minors in physics and chemistry.

In 1952–53, Irwin Hoffman taught chemistry at Regis Jesuit High School in Aurora, CO.

In 1957, he received a Colorado State Department of Education Temporary Teacher Certificate.

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