JOSIAH GIBBS

Congratulations are due the author for his introduction to Gibbs' innovations in thermodynamics and his contributions to theoretical mathematics. If he failed to bring Gibbs to life, that is hardly Mr. Leerburger's fault, for it is literally true that his shy and introverted subject lived his life in his head. Gibbs grew up in the shadow of Yale University where he later did all his degree work, becoming the first to receive a doctorate in the newly established graduate school of science and its first professor of physics. For 10 years, Yale paid him no salary and all the while he was winning an international reputation among the world's top mathematicians and scientists. His original work in the field of thermodynamics, so essential in practice today in the space science, is what Gibbs is chiefly remembered for now -- as a sort of familiar footnote in textbooks. A good additional title for histories and biographies supporting math courses.