Missouri Valley times. [volume] (Missouri Valley, Iowa) 1874-1931, 1910-02-03
INFANT PRODUCES; TWO
NEW ONES AT HARVARD
From Washington Star.

From Washington Star.
Harvard is all agog over its two new
infant prodigies, William James Sidis and
Norbert Wiener. Sidis is the ll-year-old
wonder who has just entered the uni-
versity with the highest honors and
whose unsurpassed record for scholastic
precocity includes such feats as reading
and spelling at two and half years old:
operating the typewriter expertly at four;
studying French and Latin. writing
book and qualifying as an accountant all
before five entering Brookline high school
at eight, and inventing a new system OF
logarithms at 10.
Oddly parallel with this interesting case
is that Of young Wiener. He Is another
Boston lad who also entered college at
the age of H. but his original alma mater
was Tufts college. When he matricu-
lated there in the fall of 1896 he was
found to be the farther advanced in phi
losophy and chemistry than the ordinary
senior. He was graduated last June. When.
at the age Of IA he received the degree OF
bachelor of arts with honor and TINS au-
tumn he has entered the graduate depart
ment OF Harvard, where he will take an
advanced course in biology and chemls-
try.
The strange similarity In these cases is,
not one of age alone, but the fathers OF
the precocious youths were both born IN
Russia, are both men of science. and nave
both been connected with Harvard, the
one as IL student, the other as professor
DR. Boris Sidis, the father of the new
Harvard prodigy. is psychopathoioslsl
practicing at Rrookline. while Leo VIE
ner. father of the Tufts prodigy, is as
sstant professor of Slavic languages at
Harvard.
Indeed, Harvard seems to have mo-
nopoly on our chief phenomena of this
category 1t used TO be Edward Everett
who was its prize prodigy, he having en-
tered when but 13 and having been grad
uated with the highest honors at IL. He
was indeed a marvel of plecocity. gaining
the reputation of an accomplished scholar
and eloquent divine when but ~, while at
q he was appointed professor OF Greek az
his alma mater.
And when our fathers We're young Cam
bridge was excited over the arrival at
Harvard of the then boy wonder. Iru-
man Henry Stafford. This lad, born ON a
Vermont farm in 1886. had commenced to
show mathematical genius as early as the
age of three. when his parents commenced
| to amuse themselves by testing his
strange ability. When lie was six, If CIV
en- the number of rods around any farm
| In the county. he could mentally calcu-
| late the number of barleycorns contained
and one of his mental calculations at TINS
| age was that there were 6l1,16O barley
corns in 104O rods. When seven he was
| studying books on algebra and geometry
and soon afterward higher mathematics
and astronomy Wanting some logarthms
he found them himself by the formulas
| and In his 10th year he published an al
/ manac of his own computation. Ina'
| wear a skilled mathematician who exam
ined him produced sum of 10 figures
| which he asked the boy to square. and the
correct answer was given within minute
| He could at the same time multiply foul
figures by four figures as rapidly as coult
| be done upon paper.
When Ii he turned out Eve almanacs
one of which. compiled for Cincinnati
reached Il sale of 24,g0o copies. The same
| year by systems of his own invention h'
re. uced by one-fourth the labor OF caieu
lating the rising and setting of the moor
1 and lessened by one-thrd the trouble o
4 calculating eclipses. But he had a rang
of genius wider than mathematics and in
1 Guiding chemistry, botany, philosophy
geography and history. He took his de
gree at Harvard in 1854, when only Is ant
was engaged until 26 III "a series of com
/ putatons of orbits of planets and comets
commenced when he was only ii. After
ward he became director of the observa
tory at Harvard. professor of astronom
at the Chicago university and at VIII
liams college, at which latter institution
he remained until his death, eight year
ago His all-round precocity, SO rare 4
the usual stage calculator was simila
to that of Andre Marie Ampere and Car
Fredlich Gauss. who had gone befor
him Ampere was born at Lyons in 1Hs
and learned to count when three or fou
by means of pebbles. Soon he becam
noted for such mental calculations a
those of Stafford and like mir, followed
scientific career, in which he became cello
DRAFTED through his investigations In cleo
tro- d ynamics. And Gauss, the son of
poor German family, first displayed hi
marvellous aptitude at three when he TO
lowed mentally u calculation of his fail
er's relative to the wages of some worn
ngmen. and detected an error in I'll
amount AT 10 he was studying hight
ANALYSIS and at - he had begun to ma!
ter classical languages, while at IA he lla
read the works of Euler, Lagrange an
Newton He became one of the foremo
rnathematicians and his 'Disquisitons c
Arithmetic" published when he was bl
"a is the foundation OF the modern theoi
of numbers.
our great. grantfathers marveled at a
American prodigy who, like Stafford. W;
a Vermont farm boy. This was Zera
coln,Irn born in 1904 He was regarded
a backward child until the end OF his six
vaar when. after he had been at gcho
bnt six weeks, his father asked him II
product of iSxe- and Immediately got Il
: answer Il ,2Gl," the result of mental ca
I, cu,ation rh,, father al once started Wi
znrab upon am exhibition tour about u
country and at the age of eight. ju
when our second war with Great Brita
was breaking out, he was taken to Lo
don where he astounded an audience
mentally determining the square root
1os e2a and the cube root of 1926 125
quickly as those numbers could be WRITE
doun 1t was not until arriving in I.o
don that he commenced to learn readll
and writing and after eight months at
parts school he returned to London whe
the Earl of Bristol took an interest
him and sent him to Westminster scho,
INT IN three years his father took him o
NJ school and started him upon an unsu
cassful career as an actor and playwright
This was when he was IS. after which
taught school, became computer. a.
returned to America, where he was Ell
Moved as Methodist preacher and final
az language teacher in seminary.
died at the age of &C. While making /
earliest childhood calculations he unde
vent contortions like those of st. Wit,
dance and he also had six fingers on ca
hand besides six toes on each foot.
HoD Kermit Roos