mathematics

Margaret Buchanan Cole

Margaret Buchanan Cole is a mathematics topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Margaret Buchanan Cole rather than just read about it. In short: Margaret Buchanan Cole (August 18, 1885 – September 10, 1959) was an American mathematician and was one of the few women to achieve a PhD in mathematics before World War II. She retired from West Virginia University as a professor emeritus in 1955.

Key takeaways

Margaret Buchanan Cole belongs to mathematics; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Margaret Buchanan Cole to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Margaret Buchanan Cole from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Margaret Buchanan Cole (August 18, 1885 – September 10, 1959) was an American mathematician and was one of the few women to achieve a PhD in mathematics before World War II. She retired from West Virginia University as a professor emeritus in 1955.

Life and work Margaret Buchanan was the second of three children born in Clinton, Pennsylvania, to Sarah Wiley and Aaron Moore Buchanan, a minister. In 1886, the family moved from Pennsylvania to Morgantown, West Virginia. From 1898 to 1902 Margaret Buchanan attended the preparatory school of West Virginia University (WVU) and then enrolled as one of the few women attending the university as a student in 1902. She was a member of many clubs and a founder of the Beta Upsilon chapter of the sorority Kappa Kappa Gamma. In 1906, she graduated with her bachelor's degree from WVU in 1906 and started teaching math at Marshall College in Huntington, West Virginia. She returned to WVU in 1907 as a graduate student and taught math there 1909–1912. She enrolled at Bryn Mawr College as a graduate student in 1918 and was awarded a President M. Carey Thomas European fellowship in 1918–1919 but she postponed that award for a year until she could combine it with another fellowship she received from the Association of Collegiate Alumnae European fellowship in 1920–1921. The awards allowed her to attend the Sorbonne in Paris where she studied under Édouard Goursat, Henri Lebesgue, and Émile Picard in mathematics and under Marie Curie and Gabriel Lippmann in physics. In June 1922 at Bryn Mawr, she completed work on her PhD in math with a minor in physics under the direction of Anna J. Pell Wheeler. Her dissertation was titled, Systems of Two Linear Integral Equations with Two Parameters and Symmetrizable Kernels. PhD in hand, she returned to teach at West Virginia University as assistant professor and was promoted to associate professor in 1925. On February 14, 1929 she resigned her position and married an old acquaintance, Harry Outen Cole, a widowed engineer who played a role in the design of the Panama Canal. In 1938, using her new name Margaret Buchanan Cole, she rejoined the WVU faculty and held several positions: instructor 1938–1941, assistant professor 1941–1952 and associate professor 1952–1955. With her retirement in 1955 at age 69 she was promoted to professor emeritus. Cole was an active alumna of the university and became the first woman president of the WVU alumni association in June 1939 after serving four years on the alumni executive council. Margaret Buchanan Cole died in Morgantown in 1959.

Tribute The Margaret Buchanan Cole Young Alumni Award honored a WVU alumnus or alumna who graduated within the last 10 years and provided outstanding service for their alma mater. The award noted it was named for the founder of WVU's Kappa Kappa Gamma sorority and the first woman to serve as president of the Alumni Association. It was last awarded in 2015.

References

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Margaret Buchanan Cole

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Margaret Buchanan Cole claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In mathematics, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Margaret Buchanan Cole before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Margaret Buchanan Cole ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Margaret Buchanan Cole

In research: Margaret Buchanan Cole appears in mathematics research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Margaret Buchanan Cole in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Margaret Buchanan Cole is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1885 births, 1959 deaths, 20th-century American academics, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Margaret Buchanan Cole outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Margaret Buchanan Cole in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Margaret Buchanan Cole means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Margaret Buchanan Cole out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Margaret Buchanan Cole in simple terms?

Why does Margaret Buchanan Cole matter?

Because it connects several mathematics ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Margaret Buchanan Cole?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Margaret Buchanan Cole.