Department of Mathematics University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign 20022002 www.math.uiuc.edu This calendar was designed by Tori Corkery for the UIUC Department of Mathematics. Special thanks goes to Sara Nelson, Lori Dick, Tess Rannebarger and Professor Joseph Rosenblatt for their help and support on this project. Photos and background information for this calendar were obtained via the web from the Turnbull WWW Server MacTutor History of Mathematics Archive, School of Mathematical and Computational Sciences, University of St. Andrews, St. Andrews, Fife, Scotland, located at www-history.mcs.st-and.ac.uk. Department of Mathematics University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign 1409 West Green Street Urbana, Illinois 61801 [email protected] www.math.uiuc.edu Tel.: 217-333-3350 Fax: 217-333-9576 Sofia Vasilyevna Kovalevskaya Born January 15, 1850 in Moscow, Russia Died February 10, 1891 in Stockholm, Sweden Sofia’s exposure to mathematics began at a very young age. She claims to have studied her father’s old calculus notes that were papered on her nursery walls in replacement for a shortage of wallpaper. She was forced to marry to be able to travel to university for studies. She studied with Karl Weierstrass at the University of Berlin and received her Ph.D. in 1874 from the University of Göttingen. She went on to lecture at the University of Stockholm, where she received tenure. During her years at Stockholm, she carried out what many consider her most important research. She taught courses on the latest topics in analysis and became an editor of the new journal Acta Mathematica. The topic of the 1886 Prix Bordin of the French Academy of Sciences was for significant contributions to the problem of the study of rigid body. Sophia entered and won. In recognition of the brilliance of this work, the prize money was raised from 3,000 to 5,000 francs. Sun Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat 1 2 3 4 5 New Year's Day 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 December 2001 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 Martin Luther February King Jr.’s Birthday 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 27 28 29 30 31 New Moon First Quarter Full Moon Last Quarter Department of Mathematics University of Illinois at U-C 1409 W. Green Street Urbana, IL 61801 (217)333-3350 office @math.uiuc.edu www.math.uiuc.edu 2002 Johann P. G. Lejeune Dirichlet Born February 13, 1805 in Düren, French Empire (now Germany) Died May 5, 1859 in Göttingen, Hanover (now Germany) Even before Dirichlet entered the Gymnasium in Bonn in 1817, at the age of 12, he had developed a passion for mathematics and spent his pocket- money on buying mathematics books. After two years at the Gymnasium in Bonn, his parents decided they would rather he attend the Jesuit College in Cologne where he had the good fortune to be taught by Ohm. At age 16, he decided to study in Paris. His first paper in 1825 was to bring him instant fame since it concerned the famous Fermat’s Last Theorem. Dirichlet is also well known for his papers on conditions for the convergence of trigonometric series and the use of the series to represent arbitrary functions. These series had been used previously by Fourier in solving differential equations. Because of this work, Dirichlet is considered the founder of the theory of Fourier series. Sun Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 Lincoln's Birthday St. Valentine's Day 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 January 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 March President's Day Washington's 1 2 Birthday 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 24 25 26 27 28 New Moon First Quarter Full Moon Last Quarter Department of Mathematics University of Illinois at U-C 1409 W. Green Street Urbana, IL 61801 (217)333-3350 office @math.uiuc.edu www.math.uiuc.edu 2002 Emmy Amalie Noether Born March 23, 1882 in Erlangen, Bavaria, Germany Died April 14, 1935 in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania In 1900 Noether became a certificated teacher of English and French in Bavarian girls schools. However, Noether never became a language teacher. Women were allowed to study at German universities unofficially and she attended the University of Erlangen during 1900-1902. Having passed the matriculation examination in Nürnberg in 1903, she went to the University of Göttingen and studied with Blumenthal, Hilbert, Klein and Minkowski. In 1907 she was granted a doctorate after working under Paul Gordan. It was her work in the theory of invariants which led to formulations for several concepts of Einstein’s general theory of relativity. At Göttingen, after 1919, Noether moved away from invariant theory to work on ideal theory, producing an abstract theory which helped develop ring theory into a major mathematical topic. She moved to the U.S. in 1933 to teach at Bryn Mawr College. Sun Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 February 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 April St. Patrick's Day Vernal Equinox 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 New Moon First Quarter Palm Full Moon Last Quarter Sunday Department of Mathematics University of Illinois at U-C 1409 W. Green Street Urbana, IL 61801 (217)333-3350 office @math.uiuc.edu 31 First Day of Good Friday www.math.uiuc.edu Easter Passover 2002 Johann Carl Friedrich Gauss Born April 30, 1777 in Brunswick, Duchy of Brunswick (now Germany) Died February 23, 1855 in Göttingen, Hanover (now Germany) Gauss entered Brunswick Collegium Carolinum in 1792 where he independently discovered Bode’s law, the binomial theorem and the arithmetic-geometric means inequality, as well as the law of quadratic reciprocity and the prime number theorem. In 1795 he studied at Göttingen University, where he discovered the construction of a regular 17-gon by ruler and compasses––one of the most major advances in constructive geometry since the time of Greek mathematics. After receiving a degree from Brunswick in 1799, he became the director of the Göttingen Observatory in 1807. He showed how to estimate and then refine the estimation of a planet’s orbit. A six-year work period with physicist Wilhelm Weber produced discovery of Kirchhoff’s laws; they also built a primitive telegraph device which could send messages over a distance of 5000 feet and investigated the theory of terrestrial magnetism. Using the Laplace equation to aid him with his calculations, Gauss ended up specifying a location for the magnetic South pole. He continued his career over the next 50 years, becoming recognized as one of the greatest mathematicians and scientists the world has ever known. Sun Mon Tue Wed Thu Fri Sat 1 2 3 4 5 6 April Fools' Day 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 Daylight Savings Time Begins 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 March 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 Earth Day May 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 28 29 30 New Moon First Quarter Full Moon Last Quarter Department of Mathematics University of Illinois at U-C 1409 W. Green Street Urbana, IL 61801 (217)333-3350 office @math.uiuc.edu www.math.uiuc.edu 2002 John Charles Fields Born May 14, 1863 in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada Died August 9, 1932 in Toronto, Ontario, Canada John Fields received his B.A. in mathematics from the University of Toronto in 1884. After a Ph.D. at Johns Hopkins University, Fields was appointed Professor of Mathematics at Allegheny College in 1889. However, from 1892 Fields studied in Europe with Fuchs, Frobenius, Hensel, Schwarz and Planck. In 1902 Fields was appointed to the position of lecturer at the University of Toronto where he remained until his death. His main research topic was on algebraic functions. In 1924 the International Congress of Mathematicians was held at Toronto and Fields was honored by being President of the Congress. Fields is best remembered for conceiving the idea of, and for providing funds for, an international medal for mathematical distinction. Adopted at the International Congress of Mathematicians at Zurich in 1932, the first medals were awarded at the Oslo Congress of 1936.