William Charles Waterhouse (December 31, 1941 – June 26, 2016) 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 On ...

. He was a

professor emeritus ''Emeritus'' (; female: ''emerita'') is an adjective used to designate a retired chair, professor, pastor, bishop, pope, director, president, prime minister, rabbi, emperor, or other person who has been "permitted to retain as an honorary title ...

of Mathematics at

Pennsylvania State University The Pennsylvania State University (Penn State or PSU) is a Public university, public Commonwealth System of Higher Education, state-related Land-grant university, land-grant research university with campuses and facilities throughout Pennsylvan ...

.PSU Mathematics Department - Faculty
retrieved 2010-02-06. His research interests included

abstract algebra In mathematics, more specifically algebra, abstract algebra or modern algebra is the study of algebraic structures. Algebraic structures include groups, rings, fields, modules, vector spaces, lattices, and algebras over a field. The term ''a ...

number theory Number theory (or arithmetic or higher arithmetic in older usage) is a branch of pure mathematics devoted primarily to the study of the integers and arithmetic function, integer-valued functions. German mathematician Carl Friedrich Gauss (1777� ...

group scheme In mathematics, a group scheme is a type of object from Algebraic geometry, algebraic geometry equipped with a composition law. Group schemes arise naturally as symmetries of Scheme (mathematics), schemes, and they generalize algebraic groups, in ...

s, and 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 ...

Early life and education

Waterhouse was born in

Galveston, Texas Galveston ( ) is a coastal resort city and port off the Southeast Texas coast on Galveston Island and Pelican Island in the U.S. state of Texas. The community of , with a population of 47,743 in 2010, is the county seat of surrounding Galvesto ...

, on December 31, 1941. In both 1961 and 1962, Waterhouse earned a Putnam Fellowship as one of the top five competitors on the

William Lowell Putnam Mathematical Competition The William Lowell Putnam Mathematical Competition, often abbreviated to Putnam Competition, is an annual list of mathematics competitions, mathematics competition for undergraduate college students enrolled at institutions of higher learning in th ...

while he was an undergraduate at

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...

; with his 1962 performance, he led his school to a third-place team award. He received his Ph.D. in 1968 from Harvard for his thesis ''Abelian Varieties over Finite Fields'' under the supervision of

John Tate John Tate may refer to: * John Tate (mathematician) (1925–2019), American mathematician * John Torrence Tate Sr. (1889–1950), American physicist * John Tate (Australian politician) (1895–1977) * John Tate (actor) (1915–1979), Australian act ...

Career

Waterhouse took a faculty position at

Cornell University Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to teach an ...

in 1968. In 1975, he moved to Pennsylvania State University. He edited the 1966 English translation of

Gauss Johann Carl Friedrich Gauss (; german: Gauß ; la, Carolus Fridericus Gauss; 30 April 177723 February 1855) was a German mathematician and physicist who made significant contributions to many fields in mathematics and science. Sometimes refer ...

's ''

Disquisitiones Arithmeticae The (Latin for "Arithmetical Investigations") is a textbook of number theory written in Latin by Carl Friedrich Gauss in 1798 when Gauss was 21 and first published in 1801 when he was 24. It is notable for having had a revolutionary impact on th ...

'' and was the author of the textbook ''Introduction to Affine Group Schemes''.

Awards and honors

Waterhouse won the

Lester R. Ford Award Lester is an ancient Anglo-Saxon surname and given name. Notable people and characters with the name include: People Given name * Lester Bangs (1948–1982), American music critic * Lester W. Bentley (1908–1972), American artist from Wisc ...

of the

Mathematical Association of America The Mathematical Association of America (MAA) is a professional society that focuses on mathematics accessible at the undergraduate level. Members include university, college, and high school teachers; graduate and undergraduate students; pure a ...

twice, in 1984 for his paper "Do Symmetric Problems Have Symmetric Solutions?"MAA Writing Awards: Do Symmetric Problems Have Symmetric Solutions?
1984. and in 1995 for his paper "A Counterexample for Germain".MAA Writing Awards: A Counterexample for Germain

Personal life

Waterhouse died on June 26, 2016, in

State College, Pennsylvania State College is a home rule municipality in Centre County in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. It is a college town, dominated economically, culturally and demographically by the presence of the University Park campus of the Pennsylvania Sta ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Waterhouse, William C. 1941 births 2016 deaths 20th-century American mathematicians 21st-century American mathematicians Harvard University alumni Cornell University faculty Pennsylvania State University faculty Putnam Fellows People from Galveston, Texas