The Washington times. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1902-1939, 1936-09-10
NOW
What Figures
Do To People
QUICK WITS
By HELEN ESSARY

worlds SharpeSt mathematician.
The guests were a few OF those
international whizzeS who have
been helping dear old Harvard
celebrate her 300th anniversary.
While the blond Miss Wilson
fed her guests lobster she had
cooked herself, she tossed off
epigrams about differential equa-
tons, and the cardioid and some
Of its related curves.
And the guests as they absorbed
New England'S deliriouS sea food,
TESTED about the intricacieS of
Babylonian and Egyptian mathe-
mates.
It wasn't the kind of party
I'd ever be invited to-not even as
q zero hour filler-in.
But I loved hearing about it
from Miss wilson's aunt, Miss
Mary Wilson, who lives at the
KeneSaw Apartments. Miss Will
son-the aunt-Said that lots Of
the girls at Radcliffe and around
Boston have been having similar
parties this week. Sort of giving
the Harvard boys a lift during
their happy birthday season.
) Miss Wilson-the blond one
was in her natural sphere at her
dinner party. She recently got
herself a doctorate in Actuarial
Science at Radcliffe. (No, haven't
the faintest idea what that isD
During the World War she did
her bit as head computer in the
balistics unit of the Ordnance
Department.
Miss Wilson Cor DR.. wilson
one never knows what to call in
tellectual celebrities. One simply
can't address such people as
as Senator" or mfr. Secretary"
or Mr.. Ambassador" or even as
Mrs. Roosevelt -gave her little
soiree for Prof. and Mrs. R. A.
Fisher of the University of Lon
don. Prof. Fisher has just received
q pretty honor from Harvard in
recognition of his work in mathe-
NAUTICAL statistics.
Merely writing such words
makes me feel faint. But wait
until you hear about the guests
at the party and their kind OF
number work.
The dining room tinkled with
the sound of Phi Beta Kappa keys.
Every man and woman there had
q "cum laude" or magma cum
laude" past.
Dean and Mrs. George David
Birkoff, of Harvard, probably
were the ranking highbrows. The
dean recently took handful. I
mean a coat lapelful, of mathe-
NAUTICAL prizes in Venice. In Rome
he collected a ribbon from the
Pontifical Academy of Sciences.
The University of Paris decorated
him this summer for his wisdom.
His own country has given the
Dean so many decorations that
he'll soon have to begin sending
them to the Salvation Army to
make space in the attic.
Prof. and Mrs. T. H. Brown and
Prof. and Mrs. E. V. Hunting, of
Harvard, also we're at the dinner.
It was Prof. Hunting who turned
out that beguiling little publica-
ton known as:
"FOur Place Tables Of LOga-
Fithms and TrigOnOmetric Func-
tiOns-Arranged for Decimal Di-
vision of the Degree"
On his vacation this summer,
Prof. Hunting investigated the
multiplication table cat least that
was what I understood as it is
found in Mexico.
Brown University was repre-
scented around Miss Wilson's din
ner table by several other people
who were good at figures. Among
them were Dean and Mrs. R. D.
G, Richardson (the Dean is perma-
nent secretary of the Mathemati-
cal Society and by a professor
with the most divine name-R.
C. Archivald Brown. Don't you
love it?
Nor was the Great Northwest
overlooked. Dean and Mrs. w. H.
Bussey and Prof. Durham Jack
son glorified the University OF
Minnesota. And another guest was
Prof, Gilbert AmeS Bliss, of the
University of Chicago, and asso-
ciate editor of the Annals of Math-
en1atics. It's a magazine I've
never seen.
Prof. Burton Howard Camp,
Ohio Wesleyan's Bright Child,
helped make Miss Wilson'S party.
The Carnegie Institute of Tech.
nology is the business office OF
another guest, Prof. L. L. Dimes.
Prof. H. L. Rietz, of the
University of Iowa, and president
of the Institute of Mathematical
Statistics, was there too. I'D
thought that all statistics were
mathematical. Probably I'm
wrong0
Shedding the aura of his genius
around Cambridge was the only
man in America who has ever
been the President of the Math-
ematical Society as well as presi-
dent of the Mathematical Associa-
ton. Between times this professor
e. r. writes text
books which make higher trigo-
nometry sound like two and two
make four.
I've mentioned these guests
specifically-not that think