Henry Wilbraham (25 July 1825 – 13 February 1883) was an English mathematician. He is known for discovering and explaining the
Gibbs phenomenon
In mathematics, the Gibbs phenomenon, discovered by Available on-line at:National Chiao Tung University: Open Course Ware: Hewitt & Hewitt, 1979. and rediscovered by , is the oscillatory behavior of the Fourier series of a piecewise continuousl ...
nearly fifty years before
J. Willard Gibbs
Josiah Willard Gibbs (; February 11, 1839 – April 28, 1903) was an American scientist who made significant theoretical contributions to physics, chemistry, and mathematics. His work on the applications of thermodynamics was instrumental in t ...
did. Gibbs and
Maxime Bôcher
Maxime Bôcher (August 28, 1867 – September 12, 1918) was an American mathematician who published about 100 papers on differential equations, series, and algebra. He also wrote elementary texts such as ''Trigonometry'' and ''Analytic Geometry''. ...
, as well as nearly everyone else, were unaware of Wilbraham's paper on the Gibbs phenomenon.
Biography
Henry Wilbraham was born to George and Lady Anne Wilbraham at
Delamere,
Cheshire
Cheshire ( ) is a ceremonial and historic county in North West England, bordered by Wales to the west, Merseyside and Greater Manchester to the north, Derbyshire to the east, and Staffordshire and Shropshire to the south. Cheshire's county t ...
.
His family was privileged, with his father a parliamentarian and his mother the daughter of the
Earl Fortescue
Earl Fortescue is a title in the Peerage of Great Britain that was created in 1789 for Hugh Fortescue, 3rd Baron Fortescue (1753–1841), a member of parliament for Beaumaris and Lord-Lieutenant of Devon.
History
The Earls Fortescue desce ...
. He attended
Harrow School
(The Faithful Dispensation of the Gifts of God)
, established = (Royal Charter)
, closed =
, type = Public schoolIndependent schoolBoarding school
, religion = Church of E ...
before being admitted to
Trinity College, Cambridge
Trinity College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Founded in 1546 by Henry VIII, King Henry VIII, Trinity is one of the largest Cambridge colleges, with the largest financial endowment of any college at either Cambridge ...
at the age of 16. He received a BA in 1846 and an MA in 1849 from Cambridge.
At the age of 22 he published his paper on the Gibbs phenomenon. He remained at Trinity as a Fellow until 1856. In 1864 he married Mary Jane Marriott, and together they had seven children. In the last years of his life, he was the District
Registrar
A registrar is an official keeper of records made in a register. The term may refer to:
Education
* Registrar (education), an official in an academic institution who handles student records
* Registrar of the University of Oxford, one of the se ...
of the
Chancery Court at
Manchester
Manchester () is a city in Greater Manchester, England. It had a population of 552,000 in 2021. It is bordered by the Cheshire Plain to the south, the Pennines to the north and east, and the neighbouring city of Salford to the west. The t ...
.
References
*
Paul J. Nahin
Paul J. Nahin (born November 26, 1940 in Orange County, California) is an American electrical engineer and author who has written 20 books on topics in physics and mathematics, including biographies of Oliver Heaviside, George Boole, and Claude Sh ...
, ''Dr. Euler's Fabulous Formula,'' Princeton University Press, 2006. Ch. 4, Sect. 4.
*
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Wilbraham, Henry
1825 births
1883 deaths
19th-century English mathematicians
Mathematical analysts
People educated at Harrow School
Alumni of Trinity College, Cambridge
People from Cheshire