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Margaret P. Martin

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Margaret P. Martin
Born(1915-04-22)April 22, 1915
DiedMay 3, 2012(2012-05-03) (aged 97)
Roseville, Minnesota
OccupationMathematician
Academic background
Alma materUniversity of Minnesota
ThesisSome new systems of orthogonal polynomials on algebraic curves (1944)
Academic advisorsDunham Jackson
Academic work
DisciplineStatistics
Sub-disciplineBiostatistics
InstitutionsVanderbilt University,
University of Minnesota,
Columbia University,
Syracuse University,
Johns Hopkins University,
U.S.D.A. Forest Service

Margaret Pearl Martin (April 22, 1915 – May 3, 2012) was an American statistician, associated with the University of Minnesota.[1] Most of her statistical research was performed as a consultant on public health studies, in connection with her work teaching statistics in medical schools.[2]

Education and career

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Martin was born in Duluth, and became valedictorian of her high school in Saint Paul, Minnesota.[1] She writes that she was pushed into her academic career by her mother, who had quit a teaching job to become married and was disappointed by that decision.[2] She earned a bachelor's, master's degree, and Ph.D. in mathematics from the University of Minnesota.[1] At Minnesota, she found mentors in two older women mathematicians, Gladys Gibbens and Sally Elizabeth Carlson.[2] Her 1944 dissertation, Some new systems of orthogonal polynomials on algebraic curves, was in pure mathematics, but she also graduated with a minor in biostatistics.[3]

She became an instructor of biostatistics at Columbia University[4] for the rest of World War II,[1] while also consulting for the New York City Health Department,[2] and then in 1945 obtained an assistant professorship in biostatistics at Minnesota.[5] Not long after, she moved again, to Vanderbilt University, where in the 1950s she co-authored many of her most significant research contributions as part of the Vanderbilt cooperative study of maternal and infant nutrition.[6] After postdoctoral study at the University of Chicago she also taught at Syracuse University and Johns Hopkins University before returning a third time to the University of Minnesota as a faculty member again.[1]

After over twenty years and two tenured positions in academia, and desiring to be closer to her aging parents, Martin retired from her faculty position and joined the United States Forest Service, where she worked for another twenty years before retiring again.[2]

Recognition

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In 1964 Martin was elected as a Fellow of the American Statistical Association "for her skill in imparting her knowledge of biometrics and statistics to others; and for her services in the biomentrics profession".[7]

References

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  1. ^ a b c d e Margaret P. Martin, PhD, Benson Funeral Home, retrieved 2017-11-18
  2. ^ a b c d e Murray, Margaret A. M. (2001), Women Becoming Mathematicians: Creating a Professional Identity in Post-World War II America, MIT Press, pp. 42, 44–45, 66–67, 100, 166, 168, ISBN 9780262632461
  3. ^ "Notes", Bulletin of the American Mathematical Society, 51 (5): 360–363, 1945, doi:10.1090/S0002-9904-1945-08346-3
  4. ^ "School of Public Health Officers of Instruction", Announcement of the School of Public Health of the Faculty of Medicine for the Winter and Spring Sessions 1945–1946, Columbia University Bulletin of Information, 45th Series, vol. 39, Columbia University, August 25, 1945, pp. 5–6
  5. ^ "Notes", Bulletin of the American Mathematical Society, 51 (9): 651–654, 1945, doi:10.1090/S0002-9904-1945-08423-7
  6. ^ National Research Council Committee on Maternal Nutrition (1970), Annotated Bibliography on Maternal Nutrition, Public Health Service publications, vol. 2055, National Academies, pp. 43, 56
  7. ^ "New ASA Fellows – 1964", The American Statistician, 19 (1): 36–37, February 1965, doi:10.1080/00031305.1965.10480393, JSTOR 2682318