Mathematicians Of The Day

19th January



On this day in 1882, J J Sylvester wrote a letter to support a request of two associates that Christine Ladd's fellowship be continued for another year. She had been allowed to attend the all-male Johns Hopkins in 1878. She had a $500 a year fellowship for the three years 1879-82, but she was not entitled to the title "Fellow" nor was her name recorded on the list of students at the university.

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Quotation of the day

From Alfred Clebsch
Research may start from definite problems whose importance it recognizes and whose solution is sought more or less directly by all forces. But equally legitimate is the other method of research which only selects the field of its activity and, contrary to the first method, freely reconnoitres in the search for problems which are capable of solution. Different individuals will hold different views as to the relative value of these two methods. If the first method leads to greater penetration it is also easily exposed to the danger of unproductivity. To the second method we owe the acquisition of large and new fields, in which the details of many things remain to be determined and explored by the first method.