Lillian Katie Bradley
Born(1921-10-15)October 15, 1921
Tyler, Texas
DiedFebruary 11, 1995(1995-02-11) (aged 73)
NationalityAmerican
OccupationMathematician
Years active1938 - ???
Known forBeing the first black woman to receive a mathematics doctorate from the University of Texas

Lillian Katie Bradley (October 15, 1921[1] – February 11, 1995[2]) was an American mathematician and mathematics educator who in 1960 became the first African-American woman to earn a doctorate in any subject at the University of Texas at Austin.[1][3][4][5] She accomplished this ten years after African-Americans were first admitted to the school, and despite the dominance of the mathematics department at Austin by R. L. Moore, known for his segregationist views and for his snubs of African-American students.[6]

Bradley was born in Tyler, Texas. She earned a bachelor's degree in mathematics in 1938 from Texas College, and a master's degree in mathematics education in 1946 from the University of Michigan.[1] She became a teacher at a segregated black high school in Hawkins, Texas, at Paul Quinn College, and at Texas College, before becoming an assistant professor of mathematics at Prairie View A&M College. There, in 1957–1958, she was awarded a National Science Faculty Fellowship, one of only 100 awarded in the inaugural year of the program.[3]

She completed her doctorate at the University of Texas in July 1960.[3] Her dissertation, in mathematics education, was An Evaluation of the Effectiveness of a Collegiate General Mathematics Course.[7] In 1962 she moved from Prairie View to Texas Southern University, as an associate professor.[8]

Bradley died in February 1995 at the age of 76.[2]

References

  1. 1 2 3 Williams, Scott W., "Lillian K. Bradley", Black Women in Mathematics, State University of New York at Buffalo Department of Mathematics, retrieved 2018-02-20
  2. 1 2 "Dr. Lillian Bradley", Tyler Morning Telegraph, p. 6, February 13, 1995 – via Newspapers.com; note that this source has an incorrect birthdate.
  3. 1 2 3 "Dr. Lillian Katie Bradley", News and Names, The Texas Standard, vol. 34, no. 5, p. 40, November–December 1960
  4. ↑ Webster, Raymond B. (1999), African American Firsts in Science and Technology, Gale Group, p. 403, ISBN 9780787638764
  5. ↑ Winegarten, Ruthe; Humphrey, Janet G.; Werden, Frieda (2014), Black Texas Women: A Sourcebook, University of Texas Press, p. 307, ISBN 9780292785564
  6. ↑ McCann, Mac (May 29, 2015), "Written in Stone: History of racism lives on in UT monuments", The Austin Chronicle
  7. ↑ Suydan, Marilyn N. (December 1975), Compilation of Research on College Mathematics Education (PDF), National Institute of Education, p. 90
  8. ↑ "News and Notices", American Mathematical Monthly, 69 (2): 181–185, February 1962, doi:10.1080/00029890.1962.11989853, JSTOR 2312575


This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.