William Fogg Osgood
William Fogg Osgood (born March 10, 1864 in Boston , † July 22, 1943 in Belmont , Massachusetts ) was an American mathematician .
Live and act
Osgood was born the son of a doctor in Boston and studied classical languages at the Boston Latin School and at Harvard University (from 1882), where he switched to mathematics under the influence of Frank Nelson Cole , William Byerly and Benjamin Peirce . He graduated (Bachelor) in 1886 and got his Masters degree a year later. In 1887 he went to the University of Göttingen on a scholarship to study with Felix Klein , and in 1889 to the University of Erlangen , where he received his doctorate in 1890 with Max Noether on Abelian functions. In the same year he married Theresa Ruprecht (from the family of the co-founder of the Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht publishing house), whom he had met in Göttingen. From 1890 to 1893 he was a tutor in mathematics at Harvard, in 1893 he became an assistant professor and in 1903 a full professor. With the new ideas imported from Europe (especially from Germany, to which Osgood had a special affinity throughout his life - he dressed and behaved like a German professor at the time), Osgood and Maxime Bôcher brought a breath of fresh air to Harvard.
Osgood had three children with his first wife, but divorced and married Marston Morse's ex-wife, divorced two years earlier, in 1932 , which sparked a scandal that resulted in Osgood's departure from Harvard. Osgood then taught at Beijing University for two years before settling in Belmont.
Osgood worked mainly in analysis , e.g. B. via differential equations and calculus of variations. In 1900 he gave the first strict proof of Riemann's mapping theorem for restricted areas. He also wrote early works on the theory of several complex variables (he wrote a monograph on this in 1914). He was also known for his three-volume textbook on function theory (1907, 1923, 1932).
In 1899 he was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences , in 1904 to the National Academy of Sciences and in 1915 to the American Philosophical Society . From 1905 to 1906 he was President of the American Mathematical Society . In 1922 he was elected a corresponding member of the Göttingen Academy of Sciences . In 1923 he was elected a member of the Leopoldina .
literature
- JL Walsh: A history of the Riemann mapping theorem. In: American Mathematical Monthly. March 1973, pp. 270-276.
Web links
- John J. O'Connor, Edmund F. Robertson : William Fogg Osgood. In: MacTutor History of Mathematics archive .
- WF Osgood: Textbook of Function Theory. and Plane and solid geometry. (on-line)
- WF Osgood: General theory of the analytical functions of one or more complex quantities. In: Encyclopedia of Mathematical Sciences, including its applications.
Individual evidence
- ↑ William Fogg Osgood in the Mathematics Genealogy Project (English)
- ^ Member History: William F. Osgood. American Philosophical Society, accessed November 2, 2018 .
- ↑ Holger Krahnke: The members of the Academy of Sciences in Göttingen 1751-2001 (= Treatises of the Academy of Sciences in Göttingen, Philological-Historical Class. Volume 3, Vol. 246 = Treatises of the Academy of Sciences in Göttingen, Mathematical-Physical Class. Episode 3, vol. 50). Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2001, ISBN 3-525-82516-1 , p. 183.
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Osgood, William Fogg |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | American mathematician |
| DATE OF BIRTH | March 10, 1864 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Boston , Massachusetts |
| DATE OF DEATH | July 22, 1943 |
| Place of death | Belmont , Massachusetts |