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Leonard Rogers
Times obituary
MATHEMATICS AT LEEDS
Professor Leonard James Rogers, F.R.S., late Professor of Mathematics at the University of Leeds, died on Tuesday at the age of 71.
He was born on March 30, 1862, and was one of the five sons of Professor J. E. Thorold Rogers, the economist. After receiving his first education privately, he went up to Oxford in 1880 as a scholar of Balliol College, where J. W. Russell, the mathematician, was his tutor. He obtained a first class in both Mathematical Moderations and the final school of mathematics, the junior University mathematical scholarship in 1881, and the senior in 1885. He also obtained a second class in Classical Moderations In 1888 he was appointed Professor of Mathematics at Yorkshire College, which he saw developed into the University of Leeds, and he held the Chair until 1919. Apart from mathematics, his chief interest was music; he had taken the degree of Mus.Bac. at Oxford in 1884. Professor Rogers was unmarried. He was a brother of A. G. L. Rogers, who did valuable work at the Board of Agriculture on the diseases of animals and plants, and of the Rev. Professor C. F. Rogers of King's College, London. His only sister is Miss Annie Rogers, whose work in promoting women's education at Oxford is well known.
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Dr. W. H. Harris, of St. George's Chapel, Windsor, writes:
In your obituary notice of Professor Leonard Rogers, you truly say that apart from mathematics, his chief interest was music. Since 1919, when ill-health compelled him to resign the Professorial Chair of Mathematics at Leeds, he entered very fully into the musical life of Oxford. He sang as regularly as his health would allow in the Oxford Bach Choir, and whenever there was any doubt among the basses as to "the respective merits of two adjacent notes" he invariably sang the right one; he had an unusually true ear.
During my time conducting the choir, I can hardly remember a time when he would not bicycle around to me before a first rehearsal, his copy marked (a) with all misprints corrected and (b) with anticipated mistakes and incorrect entries. "You'll find them, singing A there instead of B." Here the basses won't come in at all; they never do!" He was quite right; they never did. His knowledge of the cantatas of J. S. Bach was quite exceptional, and he used to sing the bass recitatives and arias with beautiful rhythm and flexibility. Imagine him, and I must have gone through all the bass (and many other) solos in the cantatas during my time at Oxford; and it is because I feel I owe a great deal to his fine enthusiasm and musical culture that I venture to send these lines as a small tribute to the memory of a very remarkable and lovable man.
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Mr. Benchara Branford writes:
As the first University Lecturer in the Department of Mathematics at Leeds, and thus intimately associated during the closing decade of the last century with my then chief, the late Professor Rogers, in his early manhood, may I be permitted to record, in supplement to your obituary notice, what impressed me as his characteristic quality? It was his manifestation in a rare degree of refinement and grace, whether in his mathematics and music, his linguistic and architectural interests, or his skating and other athletic achievements; above all, in his habitual behavior and movements; and this expression of beauty was rooted in his profound reverence for truth, alike scientific and aesthetic.
MATHEMATICS AT LEEDS
Professor Leonard James Rogers, F.R.S., late Professor of Mathematics at the University of Leeds, died on Tuesday at the age of 71.
He was born on March 30, 1862, and was one of the five sons of Professor J. E. Thorold Rogers, the economist. After receiving his first education privately, he went up to Oxford in 1880 as a scholar of Balliol College, where J. W. Russell, the mathematician, was his tutor. He obtained a first class in both Mathematical Moderations and the final school of mathematics, the junior University mathematical scholarship in 1881, and the senior in 1885. He also obtained a second class in Classical Moderations In 1888 he was appointed Professor of Mathematics at Yorkshire College, which he saw developed into the University of Leeds, and he held the Chair until 1919. Apart from mathematics, his chief interest was music; he had taken the degree of Mus.Bac. at Oxford in 1884. Professor Rogers was unmarried. He was a brother of A. G. L. Rogers, who did valuable work at the Board of Agriculture on the diseases of animals and plants, and of the Rev. Professor C. F. Rogers of King's College, London. His only sister is Miss Annie Rogers, whose work in promoting women's education at Oxford is well known.
___________________________________________________
Dr. W. H. Harris, of St. George's Chapel, Windsor, writes:
In your obituary notice of Professor Leonard Rogers, you truly say that apart from mathematics, his chief interest was music. Since 1919, when ill-health compelled him to resign the Professorial Chair of Mathematics at Leeds, he entered very fully into the musical life of Oxford. He sang as regularly as his health would allow in the Oxford Bach Choir, and whenever there was any doubt among the basses as to "the respective merits of two adjacent notes" he invariably sang the right one; he had an unusually true ear.
During my time conducting the choir, I can hardly remember a time when he would not bicycle around to me before a first rehearsal, his copy marked (a) with all misprints corrected and (b) with anticipated mistakes and incorrect entries. "You'll find them, singing A there instead of B." Here the basses won't come in at all; they never do!" He was quite right; they never did. His knowledge of the cantatas of J. S. Bach was quite exceptional, and he used to sing the bass recitatives and arias with beautiful rhythm and flexibility. Imagine him, and I must have gone through all the bass (and many other) solos in the cantatas during my time at Oxford; and it is because I feel I owe a great deal to his fine enthusiasm and musical culture that I venture to send these lines as a small tribute to the memory of a very remarkable and lovable man.
___________________________________________________
Mr. Benchara Branford writes:
As the first University Lecturer in the Department of Mathematics at Leeds, and thus intimately associated during the closing decade of the last century with my then chief, the late Professor Rogers, in his early manhood, may I be permitted to record, in supplement to your obituary notice, what impressed me as his characteristic quality? It was his manifestation in a rare degree of refinement and grace, whether in his mathematics and music, his linguistic and architectural interests, or his skating and other athletic achievements; above all, in his habitual behavior and movements; and this expression of beauty was rooted in his profound reverence for truth, alike scientific and aesthetic.
