Frank Morley (September 9, 1860 – October 17, 1937) was a leading mathematician, known mostly for his teaching and research in the fields of
algebra
Algebra () is one of the broad areas of mathematics. Roughly speaking, algebra is the study of mathematical symbols and the rules for manipulating these symbols in formulas; it is a unifying thread of almost all of mathematics.
Elementary ...
and
geometry
Geometry (; ) is, with arithmetic, one of the oldest branches of mathematics. It is concerned with properties of space such as the distance, shape, size, and relative position of figures. A mathematician who works in the field of geometry is ...
. Among his mathematical accomplishments was the discovery and proof of the celebrated
Morley's trisector theorem
In plane geometry, Morley's trisector theorem states that in any triangle, the three points of intersection of the adjacent angle trisectors form an equilateral triangle, called the first Morley triangle or simply the Morley triangle. The theorem ...
in elementary
plane geometry
Euclidean geometry is a mathematical system attributed to ancient Greek mathematician Euclid, which he described in his textbook on geometry: the '' Elements''. Euclid's approach consists in assuming a small set of intuitively appealing axioms ...
.
He led 50 Ph.D.'s to their degrees, and was said to be:
:"...one of the more striking figures of the relatively small group of men who initiated that development which, within his own lifetime, brought Mathematics in America from a minor position to its present place in the sun."
Life
Morley was born in the town of
Woodbridge in Suffolk, England. His parents were Elizabeth Muskett and Joseph Roberts Morley,
Quakers
Quakers are people who belong to a historically Protestant Christian set of denominations known formally as the Religious Society of Friends. Members of these movements ("theFriends") are generally united by a belief in each human's abil ...
who ran a
china shop. After being educated at
Woodbridge School
Woodbridge School is an independent school in Woodbridge, Suffolk, England, founded in 1577, for the poor of Woodbridge. It was later supported by the Seckford Foundation. Woodbridge School has been co-educational since September 1974.
Histor ...
, Morley went on to
King's College, Cambridge
King's College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Formally The King's College of Our Lady and Saint Nicholas in Cambridge, the college lies beside the River Cam and faces out onto King's Parade in the centre of the cit ...
(B.A., 1884).
In 1887, Morley moved to
Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...
. He taught at
Haverford College until 1900, when he became chairman of the mathematics department at
Johns Hopkins University
Johns Hopkins University (Johns Hopkins, Hopkins, or JHU) is a private research university in Baltimore, Maryland. Founded in 1876, Johns Hopkins is the oldest research university in the United States and in the western hemisphere. It consi ...
. His publications include ''Elementary Treatise on the Theory of Functions'' (1893), with
James Harkness; and ''Introduction to the Theory of Analytic Functions'' (1898). He was President of the
American Mathematical Society
The American Mathematical Society (AMS) is an association of professional mathematicians dedicated to the interests of mathematical research and scholarship, and serves the national and international community through its publications, meetings, ...
from 1919 to 1920 and was the editor of the ''
American Journal of Mathematics
The ''American Journal of Mathematics'' is a bimonthly mathematics journal published by the Johns Hopkins University Press.
History
The ''American Journal of Mathematics'' is the oldest continuously published mathematical journal in the United S ...
'' from 1900 to 1921. He was an
invited speaker at the International Congress of Mathematicians
This is a list of International Congresses of Mathematicians Plenary and Invited Speakers. Being invited to talk at an International Congress of Mathematicians has been called "the equivalent, in this community, of an induction to a hall of fame." ...
in 1912 at Cambridge (England), in 1924 at Toronto, and in 1936 at Oslo.
In 1933 he and his son
Frank Vigor Morley Frank Vigor Morley (4 January 1899 – 8 October 1980) was an American mathematician, author, editor and publishing executive. As had his two older brothers, Christopher and Felix, Morley attended Haverford College and then studied at the Universi ...
published the "stimulating volume", ''Inversive Geometry''. The book develops
complex number
In mathematics, a complex number is an element of a number system that extends the real numbers with a specific element denoted , called the imaginary unit and satisfying the equation i^= -1; every complex number can be expressed in the fo ...
s as a tool for geometry and
function theory. Some non-standard terminology is used such as "
base-circle" for
unit circle
In mathematics, a unit circle is a circle of unit radius—that is, a radius of 1. Frequently, especially in trigonometry, the unit circle is the circle of radius 1 centered at the origin (0, 0) in the Cartesian coordinate system in the Eucli ...
and "
turn" for a point on it.
He was a strong
chess
Chess is a board game for two players, called White and Black, each controlling an army of chess pieces in their color, with the objective to checkmate the opponent's king. It is sometimes called international chess or Western chess to dist ...
player and once beat world champion
Emanuel Lasker
Emanuel Lasker (; December 24, 1868 – January 11, 1941) was a German chess player, mathematician, and philosopher who was World Chess Champion for 27 years, from 1894 to 1921, the longest reign of any officially recognised World Chess Cham ...
in a game of chess.
He died in
Baltimore
Baltimore ( , locally: or ) is the List of municipalities in Maryland, most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland, fourth most populous city in the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic, and List of United States cities by popula ...
, Maryland at age 77.
His three sons are novelist
Christopher Morley
Christopher Darlington Morley (May 5, 1890 – March 28, 1957) was an American journalist, novelist, essayist and poet. He also produced stage productions for a few years and gave college lectures.''Online Literature''
Biography
Morley was bo ...
,
Pulitzer Prize winner
Felix Morley
Felix Muskett Morley (January 6, 1894 – March 13, 1982) was a Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Writing, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and college administrator from the United States.
Biography
Morley was born in Haverford, Pennsylvania, his f ...
, and
Frank Vigor Morley Frank Vigor Morley (4 January 1899 – 8 October 1980) was an American mathematician, author, editor and publishing executive. As had his two older brothers, Christopher and Felix, Morley attended Haverford College and then studied at the Universi ...
, also a mathematician.
Works
* 1893: (with James Harkness
''A treatise on the theory of functions'' (New York: Macmillan)
* 1898: (with James Harkness
''Introduction to the Theory of Analytic Functions''(G.E.Stechert And Company)
* 1919: ''On the Lüroth Quartic Curve''
* 1933: (with son
Frank Vigor Morley Frank Vigor Morley (4 January 1899 – 8 October 1980) was an American mathematician, author, editor and publishing executive. As had his two older brothers, Christopher and Felix, Morley attended Haverford College and then studied at the Universi ...
Inversive Geometry Ginn & Co., now available from
HathiTrust
See also
*
cis
Cis or cis- may refer to:
Places
* Cis, Trentino, in Italy
* In Poland:
** Cis, Świętokrzyskie Voivodeship, south-central
** Cis, Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship, north
Math, science and biology
* cis (mathematics) (cis(''θ'')), a trigonome ...
*
Turn
*
Lüroth quartic
In mathematics, a Lüroth quartic is a nonsingular quartic plane curve containing the 10 vertices of a complete pentalateral. They were introduced by . showed that the Lüroth quartics form an open subset of a degree 54 hypersurface
In geometry, ...
*
Morley centers In geometry the Morley centers are two special points associated with a plane triangle. Both of them are triangle centers. One of them called first Morley center (or simply, the Morley center ) is designated as X(356) in Clark Kimberling's Encyclo ...
*
Petersen–Morley theorem
In geometry, the Petersen–Morley theorem states that, if
,
,
are three general skew lines
In three-dimensional geometry, skew lines are two lines that do not intersect and are not parallel. A simple example of a pair of skew lines is the pai ...
References
*
R.C. Archibald, ''A Semicentennial History of the American Mathematical Society (1888–1938)'', Chapter 15: The Presidents: #15 Morley 1919–20. pp. 194–201, includes bibliography of Morley's papers.
External links
*
*
*
* Clark Kimberling
Frank Morley (1860–1937) geometer
{{DEFAULTSORT:Morley, Frank
1860 births
1937 deaths
19th-century British mathematicians
19th-century American mathematicians
20th-century American mathematicians
British expatriates in the United States
British geometers
Johns Hopkins University faculty
Haverford College faculty
Presidents of the American Mathematical Society
Alumni of King's College, Cambridge
People educated at Woodbridge School
People from Woodbridge, Suffolk