Mary Greystone

Mary Graustein (born April 12, 1884 in Westminster , Massachusetts , † July 18, 1972 in Gardner , Massachusetts) was an American mathematician and university teacher .

Life and research

Graustein was born Mary Florence Curtis, the oldest of five children, and attended Fitchburg High School in Massachusetts from 1899 to 1902. In 1902 she began her studies at Wellesley College , where she was a Wellesley Honors Scholar from 1904 to 1906, and received her bachelor's degree in 1906 . She then taught German, Algebra and Geometry at Leominster High School in Westminster for two years, and traveled to Europe in the summer of 1907. From 1908 to 1910 she also taught German and science at the Cushing Academy in Ashburnham, Massachusetts. She studied botany and education at Cornell University in the summer semester of 1909 . For three semesters until 1911 she studied mathematics and natural sciences at the University of Leipzig in Germany. She then became a lecturer in mathematics at Wellesley College. From 1911 to 1914 she was an instructor and had meanwhile started her mathematics studies in 1913 at Radcliffe College . She obtained her master's degree there in 1915 and received her doctorate in 1917 with a dissertation: Curves invariant under point transformations of special type. Charles Leonard Bouton , associate professor and Julian Coolidge , assistant professor, signed their certificate as reviewers to the faculty. From 1917 to 1918 she taught at the College for Women at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland , Ohio . From 1918 to 1920 she was an instructor and then an assistant professor at Wellesley College until 1921. In the summer of 1920 she was back in Leipzig and in 1921 she married William Caspar Graustein , a mathematician who had a doctorate in Germany . After their marriage, she was on leave for two years before returning to Wellesley College as an assistant professor from 1923 to 1929. She and Rachel Blodgett Adams were tutors at Radcliffe College from 1926 to 1941, being with her husband in Europe from 1928 to 1929 and from 1937 to 1938. After the death of her husband, she taught full-time at Connecticut College and until 1942 at Hunter College . From 1942 to 1944 she was an assistant professor at Oberlin College , where she was on leave in 1943 to care for her sick mother. In 1944 she began teaching at Tufts College as an assistant professor, was promoted to associate professor in 1950, and worked there until her retirement in 1955.

Memberships

Publications (selection)

1918: The existence of the functions of the elliptic cylinder. In: Ann. Of Math. 2nd ser., Volume 20.
1918: On the rectifiability of a twisted cubic. In: Bull. Amer. Math. Soc. Volume 25.
1920: On the rectifiability of a twisted cubic. In: Bull. Amer. Math. Soc. Volume 26.
1921: On skew parabolas. In: Bull. Amer. Math. Soc. Volume 27.
1922: Curves invariant under point transformations of special type. In: Trans. Amer. Math. Soc. Volume 23.

literature

Judy Green, Jeanne LaDuke: Pioneering Women in American Mathematics: The Pre-1940 PhD’s . 2009, ISBN 978-0-8218-4376-5 .

Web links

personal data
SURNAME	Greystone, Mary
ALTERNATIVE NAMES	Curtis, Mary Florence (maiden name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	American mathematician and university professor
DATE OF BIRTH	April 12, 1884
PLACE OF BIRTH	Westminster Massachusetts
DATE OF DEATH	July 18, 1972
Place of death	Gardner , Massachusetts