Raymond Clare Archibald

Raymond Clare Archibald (7 October 1875 – 26 July 1955) was a Canadian-American mathematician. He is known for his work as a historian of mathematics, his editorships of mathematical journals and his contributions to the teaching of mathematics.

Biography Raymond Clare Archibald was born in South Branch, Stewiacke, Nova Scotia, on 7 October 1875. He was the son of Abram Newcomb Archibald (1849–1883) and Mary Mellish Archibald (1849–1901).

Archibald graduated in 1894 from Mount Allison College with B.A. degree in mathematics and teacher's certificate in violin. After teaching mathematics and violin for a year at the Mount Allison Ladies' College he went to Harvard where he received a B.A. 1896 and a M.A. in 1897. He then traveled to Europe where he attended the Humboldt University of Berlin during 1898 and received a Ph.D. cum laude from the University of Strasbourg in 1900. His advisor was Karl Theodor Reye and title of his dissertation was The Cardioide and Some of Its Related Curves.

He returned to Canada in 1900 and taught mathematics and violin at the Mount Allison Ladies' College until 1907. After a one-year appointment at Acadia University he accepted an invitation of join the mathematics department at Brown University. He stayed at Brown for the rest of his career becoming a Professor Emeritus in 1943. While at Brown he created one of the finest mathematical libraries in the western hemisphere.

Archibald returned to Mount Allison in 1954 to curate the Mary Mellish Archibald Memorial Library, the library he had founded in 1905 to honor his mother. At his death the library contained 23,000 volumes, 2,700 records, and 70,000 songs in American and English poetry and drama.

Raymond Clare Archibald was a world-renowned historian of mathematics with a lifelong concern for the teaching of mathematics in secondary schools. At the presentation of his portrait to Brown University, the head of the mathematics department, Professor Clarence Raymond Adams said of him:"The instincts of the bibliophile were also his from early years. Possessing a passion for accurate detail, systematic by nature and blessed with a memory that was the marvel of his friends, he gradually acquired a knowledge of mathematical books and their values which has scarcely been equalled. This knowledge and an untiring energy he dedicated to the upbuilding of the mathematical library at Brown University. From modest beginnings he has developed this essential equipment of the mathematical investigator to a point where it has no superior, in completeness and in convenience for the user."

Honors Archibald received honorary degrees from the University of Padua (LL.D., 1922), Mount Allison University (LL.D., 1923) and from Brown University (M.A. ad eundem, 1943). Fellow, American Association for the Advancement of Science (1906) Member, Deutsche Mathematiker-Vereinigung (1908) Member, Edinburgh Mathematical Society (1909) Member, Mathematical Association (England) (1910) Member, Société Mathématique de France (1911) Member, London Mathematical Society (1912) Charter Member, Mathematical Association of America (1916); elected president for 1922 Fellow, American Academy of Arts and Sciences (1917) Librarian, American Mathematical Society (1921–1941) Member, Circolo Matematico di Palermo (1922) Soci Fondatori, Unione Matematica Italiana (1924) Founding Member, History of Science Society (1924) Honorary Member, Society of Sciences, Cluj, Roumania (1929) Honorary Foreign Fellow, Masarykova Akademie Prace, Prague, Czecho-Slovakia (1930) Membre Effective, Académie Internationale d'Historie des Sciences (1931) Honorary Foreign Member, Polish Mathematical Society (1934) Honorary Member, New Brunswick Museum (1946) Honorary Member, Mathematical Association (England) (1949)

Editorships Associate editor, Bulletin of the American Mathematical Society (1913–20) Editor-in-chief, American Mathematical Monthly (1919–21); associate editor (1918–19) Associate editor, Revue Semestrielles des Publications Mathématiques (1923–34) Associate editor, Isis (1924–48) Associate editor, Scripta Mathematica (1932–49) Founder and editor, Mathematical Tables and Other Aids to Computation (1943–49) Co-founder and editor, Eudemes