Carolyn Eisele (June 13, 1902 – January 15, 2000) was an American

mathematician A mathematician is someone who uses an extensive knowledge of mathematics in their work, typically to solve mathematical problems. Mathematicians are concerned with numbers, data, quantity, structure, space, models, and change. History O ...

and

historian of mathematics The history of mathematics deals with the origin of discoveries in mathematics and the mathematical methods and notation of the past. Before the modern age and the worldwide spread of knowledge, written examples of new mathematical developments ...

known as an expert on the works of

Charles Sanders Peirce Charles Sanders Peirce ( ; September 10, 1839 – April 19, 1914) was an American philosopher, logician, mathematician and scientist who is sometimes known as "the father of pragmatism". Educated as a chemist and employed as a scientist for ...

....

Education and career

Eisele was born on June 13, 1902, in

The Bronx The Bronx () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Bronx County, in the state of New York. It is south of Westchester County; north and east of the New York City borough of Manhattan, across the Harlem River; and north of the New Yo ...

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...

. She studied at

Hunter College High School Hunter College High School is a secondary school located in the Carnegie Hill neighborhood on the Upper East Side of Manhattan. It is administered by Hunter College of the City University of New York (CUNY). Hunter is publicly funded, and there ...

and then

Hunter College Hunter College is a public university in New York City. It is one of the constituent colleges of the City University of New York and offers studies in more than one hundred undergraduate and postgraduate fields across five schools. It also admin ...

, graduating

Phi Beta Kappa The Phi Beta Kappa Society () is the oldest academic honor society in the United States, and the most prestigious, due in part to its long history and academic selectivity. Phi Beta Kappa aims to promote and advocate excellence in the liberal ar ...

in 1923. She earned a master's degree in mathematics and education from Columbia University in 1925. At that time, Columbia did not offer Ph.D.s in mathematics to women, but Eisele continued her graduate studies at the

University of Chicago The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, U of C, or UChi) is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois. Its main campus is located in Chicago's Hyde Park neighborhood. The University of Chicago is consistently ranked among the be ...

(where she studied

differential geometry Differential geometry is a mathematical discipline that studies the geometry of smooth shapes and smooth spaces, otherwise known as smooth manifolds. It uses the techniques of differential calculus, integral calculus, linear algebra and multilin ...

) and the

University of Southern California , mottoeng = "Let whoever earns the palm bear it" , religious_affiliation = Nonsectarian—historically Methodist , established = , accreditation = WSCUC , type = Private research university , academic_affiliations = , endowment = $8.1 ...

before returning home to New York, without a doctorate, to care for her injured father. Her studies also included

opera Opera is a form of theatre in which music is a fundamental component and dramatic roles are taken by singers. Such a "work" (the literal translation of the Italian word "opera") is typically a collaboration between a composer and a libre ...

singing, with Jeanne Fourestier in Paris in 1931 and later with Los Angeles-based voice coach Morris Halpern, whom she married in 1943. Eisele taught mathematics at

for nearly 50 years. She began teaching as an instructor there after her college graduation in 1923, eventually reached the rank of full professor in 1965, and retired in 1972. Eisele died on January 15, 2000 in

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the List of counties in New York, origin ...

, New York City.

Peirce studies

As a student at Columbia University, Eisele took a course in the

history of mathematics The history of mathematics deals with the origin of discoveries in mathematics and the mathematical methods and notation of the past. Before the modern age and the worldwide spread of knowledge, written examples of new mathematical developments ...

from

David Eugene Smith David Eugene Smith (January 21, 1860 – July 29, 1944) was an American mathematician, educator, and editor. Education and career David Eugene Smith is considered one of the founders of the field of mathematics education. Smith was born in Cort ...

, but her professional contributions to the subject began in 1947, when she took a sabbatical to prepare for a course in the history of mathematics that she had been asked to teach at Hunter College. While working in the

George Arthur Plimpton George Arthur Plimpton (July 13, 1855 – July 1, 1936) was an American publisher and philanthropist. Life and career Plimpton was born in Walpole, Massachusetts, the son of Priscilla Guild (Lewis) and Calvin Gay Plimpton. He was the son and grand ...

collection at the Columbia University library, she found a manuscript by

Fibonacci Fibonacci (; also , ; – ), also known as Leonardo Bonacci, Leonardo of Pisa, or Leonardo Bigollo Pisano ('Leonardo the Traveller from Pisa'), was an Italian mathematician from the Republic of Pisa, considered to be "the most talented Western ...

's ''

Liber Abaci ''Liber Abaci'' (also spelled as ''Liber Abbaci''; "The Book of Calculation") is a historic 1202 Latin manuscript on arithmetic by Leonardo of Pisa, posthumously known as Fibonacci. ''Liber Abaci'' was among the first Western books to describe ...

'' and in 1951 she published a paper about her discovery in ''

Scripta Mathematica ''Scripta Mathematica'' was a quarterly journal published by Yeshiva University devoted to the philosophy, history, and expository treatment of mathematics. It was said to be, at its time, "the only mathematical magazine in the world edited by spe ...

''. Other early works of Eisele on Peirce included his correspondence with

Simon Newcomb Simon Newcomb (March 12, 1835 – July 11, 1909) was a Canadian– American astronomer, applied mathematician, and autodidactic polymath. He served as Professor of Mathematics in the United States Navy and at Johns Hopkins University. Born in ...

and his

Peirce quincuncial projection The Peirce quincuncial projection is the conformal map projection from the sphere to an unfolded square dihedron, developed by Charles Sanders Peirce in 1879. Each octant projects onto an isosceles right triangle, and these are arranged into a s ...

for maps of the world. Her work on Peirce took a holistic view, in which his contributions to philosophy and logic were treated as part of a whole together with his contributions to mathematics and science, rather than as separate and unrelated chapters in his life. Eisele served as the president of the Charles S. Peirce Society from 1973 to 1975. In 1976, Eisele began publishing a multi-volume collection of Peirce's writings that she had edited, the ''New Elements of Mathematics'', and in the same year she helped organize the Peirce Bicentennial International Congress in Amsterdam.

Books

*''Studies in the Science and Mathematical Philosophy of Charles S. Peirce: Essays by Carolyn Eisele'' (1979) *''Historical Perspectives on Peirce’s Logic of Science: A History of Science'' (1985)

Awards and honors

Eisele was named a Fellow of the

American Association for the Advancement of Science The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) is an American international non-profit organization with the stated goals of promoting cooperation among scientists, defending scientific freedom, encouraging scientific responsi ...

in 1960. On her retirement from Hunter College in 1972, Eisele joined the Hunter Hall of Fame. She was given honorary doctorates from

Texas Tech University Texas Tech University (Texas Tech, Tech, or TTU) is a public research university in Lubbock, Texas. Established on , and called Texas Technological College until 1969, it is the main institution of the five-institution Texas Tech University Sy ...

in 1980 and from

Lehigh University Lehigh University (LU) is a private research university in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania in the Lehigh Valley region of eastern Pennsylvania. The university was established in 1865 by businessman Asa Packer and was originally affiliated with the Epi ...

in 1982. In 1980, Eisele became an honorary member of the crew of the

United States Coast Guard The United States Coast Guard (USCG) is the maritime security, search and rescue, and law enforcement service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the country's eight uniformed services. The service is a maritime, military, multi ...

ship ''USC&GSS Peirce''. In 1981, a symposium on Peirce studies was held in her honor at Hunter College, the proceedings of which were published as a

festschrift In academia, a ''Festschrift'' (; plural, ''Festschriften'' ) is a book honoring a respected person, especially an academic, and presented during their lifetime. It generally takes the form of an edited volume, containing contributions from the ...

in ''

Historia Mathematica ''Historia Mathematica: International Journal of History of Mathematics'' is an academic journal on the history of mathematics published by Elsevier. It was established by Kenneth O. May in 1971 as the free newsletter ''Notae de Historia Mathemati ...

''. In 1985, Eisele was given the Behavioral Sciences, History and Philosophy of Sciences award from the

New York Academy of Sciences The New York Academy of Sciences (originally the Lyceum of Natural History) was founded in January 1817 as the Lyceum of Natural History. It is the fourth oldest scientific society in the United States. An independent, nonprofit organization wit ...

.Eisele, Carolyn (1902–2000)
" In John R. Shook and Richard T. Hull, eds. '' Dictionary of Modern American Philosophers''. Bristol: Thoemmes, 2005. p.715. Her other honors include a Doctor of Humanities degree awarded by

in 1980 and a Doctor of Science degree awarded in 1982 by

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Eisele, Carolyn 1902 births 2000 deaths American women mathematicians Charles Sanders Peirce Hunter College alumni Columbia University alumni Texas Tech University alumni Hunter College faculty 20th-century American mathematicians 20th-century American women scientists 20th-century women mathematicians Fellows of the American Association for the Advancement of Science