Eric Bell
California Institute of Technology
February 7, 1883 - December 21, 1960
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Scientific Discipline: Mathematics Membership Type:
Member
(elected 1927)
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Eric Bell contributed greatly to the development of mathematics in the United States. He wrote numerous books on mathematical theory, historical figures in mathematics, and the development of mathematics. He is well known for Algebraic Arithmetic (1927) and The Development of Mathematics (1940). He also made advancements in analytic number theory, Diophantine analysis, and numerical functions.
Bell graduated from Stanford University in 1907 with an AB degree in mathematics. He went to the University of Washington and earned his master’s degree in 1908. In 1912 he received his PhD from Columbia University for his dissertation, The Cyclotomic Quinary Quintic. He became a professor at the University of Washington, where he taught mathematics from 1912 to 1926. The Mathematical Association of America elected Bell president in 1931; he served until 1933. The California Institute of Technology offered him a professorship in 1926; he taught mathematics there until 1959.
