Griffith C. Evans

Griffith Conrad Evans
Born 11 May 1887 (1887-05-11)
Died 8 December 1973 (1973-12-09) (aged 86)
Residence United States
Nationality American
Alma mater Harvard University
Scientific career
Fields Potential theory
Functional analysis
Integral equations
Institutions Rice University
University of California, Berkeley
Doctoral advisor Maxime Bôcher
Doctoral students John Gergen
Alfred Horn
Kenneth May
Charles F. Roos

Griffith Conrad Evans (11 May 1887 – 8 December 1973) was a mathematician working for much of his career at the University of California, Berkeley. He is largely credited with elevating Berkeley's mathematics department to a top-tier research department,[1] having recruited many notable mathematicians in the 1930s and 1940s.

Biography

Evans earned his PhD at Harvard in 1910 under Maxime Bôcher with a dissertation on Volterra's Integral Equation, after which he did a post-doc for two years at the University of Rome on a Sheldon Fellowship from Harvard.[2] The experience of working under Vito Volterra shaped his intellectual life and solidified his interest in the application of mathematics to a broad range of fields[3]. Evans was then appointed assistant professor at Rice University in 1912 and promoted to professor in 1916.[2] He married Isabel Mary John in 1917 and they would eventually have 3 children.[2] In 1934, he moved to University of California, Berkeley to chair the mathematics department.[4] Here, Evans was tasked with improving the department, including the initiation of a graduate program. Much of his success was due to his ability to recruit many notable research mathematicians, including Hans Lewy, Jerzy Neyman, and Alfred Tarski.[1] His own research work was in potential theory and mathematics applied to economics. He chaired Berkeley's department until 1949 and retired in 1955,[4] eventually becoming the namesake of Evans Hall at Berkeley.

Notable positions

Selected publications

  • "The Dynamics of Monopoly". The American Mathematical Monthly. 31 (2): 77–83. 1924. doi:10.2307/2300113.
  • The logarithmic potential, discontinuous Dirichlet and Neumann problems. American Mathematical Society. 1927.
  • Mathematical introduction to economics. McGraw Hill. 1930. [5]
  • Stabilité et dynamique de la production dans l’économie politique. Gauthier-Villars. 1932.
  • "On potentials of positive mass. I". Trans. Amer. Math. Soc. 37 (2): 226–253. 1935. doi:10.1090/s0002-9947-1935-1501785-8. MR 1501785.
  • "On potentials of positive mass. II". Trans. Amer. Math. Soc. 38 (2): 201–236. 1935. doi:10.1090/s0002-9947-1935-1501809-8. MR 1501809.
  • "Potentials and positively infinite singularities of harmonic functions". Monatshefte für Mathematik und Physik. 43 (1): 419–424. 1936. doi:10.1007/BF01707623.
  • "Modern methods of analysis in potential theory". Bull. Amer. Math. Soc. 48 (3): 481–502. 1937. doi:10.1090/S0002-9904-1937-06579-7. MR 1563577.
  • "Continua of minimum capacity". Bull. Amer. Math. Soc. 47 (10): 717–733. 1941. doi:10.1090/s0002-9904-1941-07541-5. MR 0005261.
  • Lectures on multiple valued harmonic functions in space. University of California Press. 1951.
  • Functionals and their applications; selected topics including integral equations. Dover. 1964.

Biographical references

  • Morrey, C. B., Jr.; Lewy, H.; Shephard, R. W.; Vaught, R. L. (May 1977), "Griffith Conrad Evans, Mathematics: Berkeley 1887-1973, Professor", 1977, University of California: In Memoriam, Berkeley, CA: University of California, Berkeley, pp. 102–103
  • Morrey, Charles B., Jr. (1983), "Griffith Conrad Evans", in National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, Biographical Memoirs, Biographical Memoirs, 54, Washington, D.C.: National Academy Press, pp. 126–155, ISBN 0-309-03391-8 .
  • Rider, Robin E. (1985), "An opportune time: Griffith C. Evans and mathematics at Berkeley" (PDF), in Duren, Peter, A Century of Mathematics in America, Part II, History of Mathematics, 2, Providence: American Mathematical Society, pp. 283–302, ISBN 0-8218-0130-9, MR 1003134, Zbl 0671.01027 .

References

  1. 1 2 Kirby, R (2008). "Mathematics at Berkeley: A History" (PDF). AMS Notices. 55 (10): 1237–1240.
  2. 1 2 3 Morrey, C. B. (1983) Griffith Conrad Evans, 1887-1973: A Biographical Memoir, National Academy of Sciences.
  3. ↑ Weintraub, Roy E. (2002). "Marginalization of Griffith C. Evans". How economics became a mathematical science. Durham: Duke University Press. ISBN 9780822328711. OCLC 48493991.
  4. 1 2 AMS Presidents: Griffith Evans
  5. ↑ C Evans (1930). Mathematical Introduction To Economics.
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