Jeanne LaDuke

Last updated

Alice Jeanne LaDuke (born June 27, 1938) is an American mathematician who specialized in mathematical analysis and the history of mathematics. She was also a child actress who appeared in one film ( The Green Promise ).

Contents

Early life and film career

LaDuke was raised on a farm in Posey County, [1] in southwest Indiana. Her parents were college-educated and an aunt who taught mathematics in Chicago frequently visited, bringing mathematics puzzles for LaDuke. [2]

As a child, she was cast from a field of 12,000 4-H members to play a small part in The Green Promise (1948) [1] as farm girl Jessie Wexford, the sister of Natalie Wood's character's love interest. [3] Wood and LaDuke shared a tutor who taught them both string games as well as their school curriculum. [4]

Education

LaDuke studied mathematics at DePauw University in the 1950s, and roomed with another mathematics major from Oregon, who showed her the state on summer camping trips. [2]

She earned a master's degree in mathematics, but was unable to obtain a teaching position with it because the schools she applied to only hired men. She returned to Oregon in 1966 as a doctoral student at the University of Oregon, [2] and completed her Ph.D. in 1969 with a dissertation in mathematical analysis supervised by Kenneth A. Ross on Ep Space: Essentially a Product of Cp Spaces. [5]

Mathematics career

After completing her doctorate, LaDuke spent the following thirty years as a faculty member of the department of mathematical sciences at DePaul University. [2] She retired in 2003. [6]

With Judy Green, she is the author of Pioneering Women in American Mathematics: The Pre-1940 PhD’s (American Mathematical Society and London Mathematical Society, 2009). [7] An annual lecture series on Women in Mathematics, Science, and Technology at DePaul is named after her. [8]

Tributes

In 2005, the Jeanne LaDuke Women in Mathematics, Science, and Technology Annual Lecture Series was begun by the DePaul University College of Liberal Arts and Sciences to honor LaDuke who taught for over 30 years at the University. She was remembered for her "groundbreaking research" on the contributions of early twentieth century women mathematicians in the United States. She retired as an Associate Professor Emeritus in the Department of Mathematical Sciences. The series ran from 2005 to 2016 and featured prominent scientists who shared their expertise with the DePaul community. [9]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dorothy Lewis Bernstein</span> American mathematician (1914–1988)

Dorothy Lewis Bernstein was an American mathematician known for her work in applied mathematics, statistics, computer programming, and her research on the Laplace transform. She was the first woman to be elected president of the Mathematics Association of America.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Florence Marie Mears</span> American mathematician

Florence Marie Mears was a professor of Mathematics at The George Washington University.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Anna Johnson Pell Wheeler</span> American mathematician

Anna Johnson Pell Wheeler was an American mathematician. She is best known for early work on linear algebra in infinite dimensions, which has later become a part of functional analysis.

Claribel Kendall was an American mathematician.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mary Frances Winston Newson</span> American mathematician (1869-1959)

Mary Frances Winston Newson was an American mathematician. She became the first female American to receive a PhD in mathematics from a European university, namely the University of Göttingen in Germany. She was also the first person to translate Hilbert's problems into English.

Grace Andrews was an American mathematician. She, along with Charlotte Angas Scott, was one of only two women listed in the first edition of American Men of Science, which appeared in 1906.

Charlotte Cynthia Barnum, mathematician and social activist, was the first woman to receive a Ph.D. in mathematics from Yale University.

Anna Margaret Mullikin (1893–1975) was an American mathematician who was one of the early investigators of point set theory. She was one of the few women to earn a PhD in math before World War II.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Emilie Martin</span> American mathematician

Emilie Norton Martin was an American mathematician and professor of mathematics at Mount Holyoke College.

Jessie Marie Jacobs Muller Offermann (1890–1954) was an American mathematician who also made contributions to the field of genetics.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Marguerite Lehr</span> American mathematician

Marguerite Lehr was an American mathematician who studied algebraic geometry, humanism in mathematics, and mathematics education.

Ruth Gentry was a pioneering American woman mathematician during the late 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century. She was the first Indiana-born woman to acquire a PhD degree in mathematics, and most likely the first woman born in Indiana to receive a doctoral degree in any scientific discipline.

Dorothy Elizabeth Stahl Brady was an American mathematician and economist. She was a professor of economics at Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania from 1958 to 1970.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Beatrice Aitchison</span> American mathematician

Beatrice Aitchison was an American mathematician, statistician, and transportation economist who directed the Transport Economics Division of the United States Department of Commerce, and later became the top woman in the United States Postal Service and the first policy-level appointee there.

Judith (Judy) Green is an American logician and historian of mathematics who studies women in mathematics. She is a founding member of the Association for Women in Mathematics; she has also served as its vice president, and as the vice president of the American Association of University Professors.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Frances Harshbarger</span> American mathematician

Frances Harshbarger was an American mathematician.

Clara Eliza Smith was an American mathematician specializing in complex analysis who became the Helen Day Gould Professor of Mathematics at Wellesley College.

Dr Clara Latimer Bacon was a mathematician and Professor of Mathematics at Goucher College. She was the first woman to earn a PhD in mathematics from Johns Hopkins University.

Katharine Elizabeth O'Brien was an American mathematician, musician and poet.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Aline Huke Frink</span> American mathematician

Aline Huke Frink was an American mathematician, and a professor on the faculty of the Pennsylvania State University from 1930 to 1969.

References

  1. 1 2 Manifold, Sara (April 27, 2011), "Movie star native will return to Mount Vernon for showing", Mount Vernon Democrat
  2. 1 2 3 4 Ryan, Catherine (Autumn 2010), "Not by the Numbers: On her own unconventional path, Jeanne LaDuke details the early history of women in American mathematics", Oregon Quarterly, University of Oregon, archived from the original on 2017-11-10, retrieved 2017-11-09
  3. Sullivan, Rebecca (2016), Natalie Wood, Palgrave Macmillan, p. 23, ISBN   9781844576708
  4. Finstad, Suzanne (2009), Natasha: The Biography of Natalie Wood, Crown/Archetype, p. 75, ISBN   9780307428660
  5. Jeanne LaDuke at the Mathematics Genealogy Project
  6. Mathematical Sciences Faculty & Staff, DePaul University College of Science and Health, retrieved 2017-11-09
  7. Reviews of Pioneering Women in American Mathematics:
  8. Hayda, Julian (October 1, 2014), "Field Museum Chief Curiosity Correspondent Emily Graslie discusses women in STEM at DePaul", The DePaula
  9. "The Jeanne LaDuke Women in Mathematics, Science, and Technology: Annual Lecture Series (2005 - 2016) University, Chicago". csh.depaul.edu. Retrieved 2024-04-24.