Person: Forder, Henry George
Henry Forder was a New Zealand mathematician who worked in geometry.
Mathematical Profile (Excerpt):
- Henry was fortunate in several ways which enabled him to obtain a first class education.
- Firstly the headmaster of the local Worstead church school which he attended realised that Henry was an exceptionally gifted boy and gave him special tuition.
- Henry, together with another pupil, founded the school debating society in 1907 and Henry took part in debates on topics such as conscription, female suffrage, the House of Lords and the justifiability of Mary Queen of Scots' execution.
- He also won many prizes from the school and he chose himself the books Lay Sermons by Thomas Henry Huxley, The Essays of Elia by Charles Lamb, Poems by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Poems by John Milton, Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray, and Oliver Cromwell by John Morley.
- Forder matriculated at Sidney Sussex College on 2 October 1907.
- By 1933 Forder had become somewhat dissatisfied with teaching so when he was invited to apply for the Chair of Mathematics at Auckland University College in New Zealand he put in an application.
- Forder spent the rest of his career in the Chair of Mathematics at Auckland.
- It is the books that Forder wrote which have given him a high reputation in the mathematical world.
- The Calculus of Extension (1941) is in many ways the most interesting of all Forder's books.
- Of course Forder's love of language was closely related to his love of books which we have mentioned already.
- Indeed, Forder was renowned as a wit and conversationist.
- Finally let us record some of the honours which Forder received.
- The Mathematical Chronicle published a H G Forder 90th birthday volume in 1980.
Born 27 September 1889, Shotesham All Saints, near Norwich, England. Died 21 September 1981, Selwyn Village, Port Chevalier, Auckland, New Zealand.
View full biography at MacTutor
Tags relevant for this person:
Origin England
Thank you to the contributors under CC BY-SA 4.0! 
- Github:
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- non-Github:
- @J-J-O'Connor
- @E-F-Robertson
References
Adapted from other CC BY-SA 4.0 Sources:
- O’Connor, John J; Robertson, Edmund F: MacTutor History of Mathematics Archive
