Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 63.djvu/193

Rh indicate that it is the pace of hard thinking that kills, all fell at the age of fifty or less.

Josiah Willard Gibbs was born at New Haven, Connecticut, February 11, 1839, and he died at the same place April 28, 1903. He was the son of Josiah Willard Gibbs, professor of sacred literal ire in Yale College from 1822 to 1861, and Mary Anna (Van Cleve) Gibbs. His preliminary academic studies were pursued at the Hopkins Grammar School, New Haven, and he entered Yale College, at the early age of fifteen years, in 1854. As an undergraduate he easily won distinction, and he took prizes for meritorious work in Latin and in mathematics.

After graduation from Yale College, in 1858,he spent five years there as a student of the mathematico-physical sciences especially. From 1803 to 1866 he served as a tutor at Yale. The next three years he spent in Europe, studying at the universities of Paris, Berlin and Heidelberg. In 1871 he was elected to the professorship of mathematical physics at Yale, and he held this chair up to the time of his death.

Early in his scientific career Professor Gibbs appears to have concentrated attention on the field of thermodynamics, and during the decade following his appointment to a professorship he produced a series of papers which placed him in the front rank of workers in this field. Indeed, the most important of these papers, 'On the Equilibrium of Heterogeneous Substances,' is now regarded as marking an epoch in the history of thermodynamics and as furnishing the foundation for the new science of physical chemistry. The comprehensive knowledge of mechanical philosophy which made him a master in thermodynamics, made him also an authority in electromagnetic science, and during the decade from 1880 to 1890 he published several noteworthy papers on the electromagnetic theory of light anti kindred topics. He was likewise a profound student of pure mathematics. His vice-presidential address, 'On Multiple Algebra,' read before the section of astronomy and mathematics of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 188G, is an original contribution of great merit in a domain already well worked by Möbius, Hamilton, Grassmann, PeireePeirce [sic], Tait and others. His more recent contributions to science are found in two volumes of the Yale BicentenialBicentennial [sic] Publications, namely, 'Vector Analysis,' edited by a pupil, Dr. E. B. Wilson, and 'Elementary Principles of Statistical Mechanics.' The unpretentious title of the latter work, though strikingly characteristic of the author, is too modest; for it appears destined to take rank among the small number of fundamental contributions to the science of mechanics.

Professor Gibbs was the recipient of many honors from scientific societies at home and abroad. He knew well how to economize his time, however; and although one of the most genial and kindly of men, he mingled sparingly with the world, and was thus, alas! too little known and appreciated, especially by the younger generation of his fellow-countrymen interested in science.

dedication of the Louisiana Purchase Exposition on April 30 demonstrated to a hundred thousand visitors that the preparations are unusually far forward. Many of the buildings are practically ready, and the fencing, grading, road-making and the like of the 1,200 acres are well advanced. Indeed, the exposition bids fair to be bigger and more successful than might have been anticipated. Thanks to hitting upon the psychological moment in international relations and of domestic liberality, money is being spent by the tens of millions.