Charles B. Morrey Jr.

Morrey graduated from Ohio State University with a B.A. in 1927 and a M.A. in 1928,[10] and then studied at Harvard University under the supervision of George Birkhoff, obtaining a Ph.D. in 1931 with a thesis entitled Invariant functions of Conservative Surface Transformations.[11] After being awarded his Ph.D, he was a National Research Council Fellow at Princeton, at the Rice Institute and finally at the University of Chicago.[7] He became a professor of mathematics at UC Berkeley in 1933, hired by Griffith Conrad Evans,[12] and was a faculty member until his retirement in 1973. In Berkeley, he was early given several administrative duties,[13] for example being the Chairman of the Department of Mathematics during the period 1949–1954,[14] and being the Acting Chairman, the Vice Chairman and the Director of the Institute of Pure and Applied Mathematics at various times. During the years 1937–1938 and 1954–1955 he was a member of the Institute for Advanced Study:[15] he was also Visiting Assistant Professor at Northwestern University, Visiting Professor at the University of Chicago and Miller Research Professor at Berkeley.[7] During World War II he was employed as a mathematician at the U.S. Ballistic Research Laboratory in Maryland.

In 1962 he was elected member of the National Academy of Sciences:[2] on May 12, 1965, he was elected fellow member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.[3] From 1967 to 1968 he was president of the American Mathematical Society.[16] On the fifth of June 1973 he was awarded the prestigious Berkeley Citation.[4] Maull (1995a, p. 10) refers also that other honors were granted him, but she does not gives any further detail.

Kelley, Lehmer & Robinson (1989, p. 107) describe him as really very gifted for friendship, having a charming sense of humor[17] and being continuously attentive for people, mathematics and musics. His human qualities are described as the complement to his ability in administrative duties and in scientific research:[18] as a confirmation of his skills in scientific research, also Maull (1995a, p. 10) states that he was one of the strongest workers in analysis.

In 1985 his widow, Frances Eleonor Morrey, née Ross, established the Charles B. Morrey Jr. Assistant Professorship at the Berkeley Mathematics department, to honor his memory.[19]

Con l'opera di Morrey il metodo diretto del Calcolo delle Variazioni riprendeva il suo cammino ed i problemi esistenziali rimasti aperti trovavano soluzione.[20]

— Gaetano Fichera, (Fichera 1995, p. 21).

Morrey worked on numerous fundamental problems in analysis, among them, the existence of quasiconformal maps, the measurable Riemann mapping theorem, Plateau's problem in the setting of Riemannian manifolds, and the characterization of lower semicontinuous variational problems in terms of quasiconvexity. He greatly contributed to the solution of Hilbert's nineteenth and twentieth problems.

Charles B. Morrey Jr. was a very effective teacher.[13] His book (Morrey 1962) was the forerunner of a sequence of texts on calculus and analytic geometry, written in collaboration with Murray H. Protter. According to Kelley, Lehmer & Robinson (1989, p. 106) and to Maull (1995a, p. 10), these books have had a wide influence on both university and high school teaching of mathematics. Morrey was also a successful advanced level teacher and thesis supervisor: at least 17 Ph.D. dissertations were written under his supervision.[13]

• American Academy of Arts and Sciences (1964–1965), "New Members Elected May 12, 1965", Records of the Academy, vol. No. 1964/1965, Boston: American Academy of Arts and Sciences, pp. 1–6, JSTOR 3785506.
• American Academy of Arts and Sciences (2011), "Morrey Jr., Charles Bradfield (1907–1984)" (PDF), Book of Members, 1780 – Present, Cambridge, MA: American Academy of Arts and Sciences, p. 379, retrieved October 23, 2011.
• American Mathematical Society (August 1984), "C.B. Morrey Jr., 1907–1984" (PDF), Notices of the American Mathematical Society, 31 (5): 474.
• American Mathematical Society (2011), "39. Charles Bradford Morrey Jr. (1907–1984)", AMS Presidents: A Timeline, Providence, RI: University of California, Berkeley, retrieved October 31, 2011.
• Kelley, J. L.; Lehmer, D. H.; Robinson, R. M. (1989), "Charles B. Morrey Jr., Mathematics: Berkeley 1907–1984, Professor Emeritus", in Krogh, David (ed.), 1989, University of California: In Memoriam, Berkeley, CA: University of California, Berkeley, pp. 105–107.
• Maull, Lou (1995a), "Donors tell their stories. Charles B. Morrey Jr." (PDF), Berkeley Mathematics Newsletter, Fall 1995, Vol. III (1): 10.
• Maull, Lou (1995b), "An interview with Frances Eleonor (Moss) Morrey" (PDF), Berkeley Mathematics Newsletter, Fall 1995, Vol. III (1): 10–11.
• Maull, Lou (1995c), "Alumna & Former Staff Establishes Fellowship. An Interview with Miss Sarah Hallam" (PDF), Berkeley Mathematics Newsletter, Fall 1995, Vol. III (1): 11, 16.
• National Academy of Sciences (July 15, 1962), "National Academy of Sciences: July 1, 1962" (PDF), PNAS, 48 (7): 1258–1294, doi:10.1073/pnas.48.7.1258, JSTOR 71750, PMC 220941, PMID 16590975.
• National Academy of Sciences (2011), Morrey, Charles B. Jr., Washington, DC: National Academy of Sciences, retrieved October 23, 2011.
• Mitchell, Janet A., ed. (1980), A Community of Scholars. Faculty and Members 1930–1980 (PDF), Princeton, New Jersey: The Institute for Advanced Study, pp. xxii+565, archived from the original (PDF) on November 7, 2017, retrieved June 27, 2016.
• The Institute for Advanced Study (2012), "Charles B. Morrey", A Community of Scholars, retrieved October 20, 2012.
• Pitcher, Everett (1988), American Mathematical Society centennial publications. Volume I. A History of the Second Fifty Years, American Mathematical Society 1939–1988., Providence, RI: American Mathematical Society, pp. viii+346, ISBN 0-8218-0125-2, MR 1002190, Zbl 0702.01017.
• Rider, Robin E. (1985), "An opportune time: Griffith C. Evans and mathematics at Berkeley" (PDF), in Duren, Peter (ed.), A Century of Mathematics in America, Part II, History of Mathematics, vol. 2, Providence, RI: American Mathematical Society, pp. 283–302, MR 1003134, Zbl 0671.01027.
• University of California (2004), "Berkeley Citation", Berkeley Awards Program, Berkeley, CA: University of California, Berkeley, retrieved October 23, 2011. A description of the history and the rules of one of the four highest honors that the Berkeley campus bestows, including a list of past recipients.

• Caraman, Petru (1974) [1968], n–Dimensional Quasiconformal (QCf) Mappings (revised ed.), București / Tunbridge Wells, Kent: Editura Academiei / Abacus Press, p. 553, ISBN 0-85626-005-3, MR 0357782, Zbl 0342.30015.
• Cesari, Lamberto (1956), Surface Area, Annals of Mathematics Studies, vol. 35, Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, pp. x+595, ISBN 0-691-09585-X, MR 0074500, Zbl 0073.04101. The work of Cesari summarizing the theory of surface area, including his own contributions to the subject.
• Cesari, Lamberto (1986), "L'opera di Leonida Tonelli e la sua influenza nel pensiero scientifico del secolo", in Montalenti, G.; Amerio, L.; Acquaro, G.; Baiada, E.; et al. (eds.), Convegno celebrativo del centenario della nascita di Mauro Picone e Leonida Tonelli (6–9 maggio 1985), Atti dei Convegni Lincei (in Italian), vol. 77, Roma: Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei, pp. 41–73, archived from the original on February 23, 2011, retrieved June 27, 2015. "The work of Leonida Tonelli and his influence on scientific thinking in this century" (English translation of the title) is an ample commemorative article, reporting recollections of the Author about teachers and colleagues, and a detailed survey of his and theirs scientific work, presented at the International congress in occasion of the celebration of the centenary of birth of Mauro Picone and Leonida Tonelli (held in Rome on May 6–9, 1985).
• Giusti, Enrico (1994), Metodi diretti nel calcolo delle variazioni, Monografie Matematiche (in Italian), Bologna: Unione Matematica Italiana, pp. VI+422, MR 1707291, Zbl 0942.49002, translated in English as Giusti, Enrico (2003), Direct Methods in the Calculus of Variations, River Edge, NJ – London – Singapore: World Scientific Publishing, pp. viii+403, doi:10.1142/9789812795557, ISBN 981-238-043-4, MR 1962933, Zbl 1028.49001.
• Fichera, Gaetano (1995), "Tre battaglie perdute da tre grandi matematici italiani", Atti del convegno di studi in memoria di Giuseppe Gemignani. Modena, 20 maggio 1994, Collana di Studi dell'Accademia (in Italian), vol. 11, Modena: Enrico Mucchi Editore on behalf of the Accademia Nazionale di Scienze, Lettere e Arti di Modena, pp. 9–28, MR 1385469. This paper, included in the Proceedings of the Study Meeting in Memory of Giuseppe Gemignani, is an account of the failures of Vito Volterra, Leonida Tonelli and Francesco Severi, when dealing with particular research problems during their career. An English translation of the title reads as:-"Three battles lost by three great Italian mathematicians".
• Radó, Tibor (1948), Length and Area, American Mathematical Society Colloquium Publications, vol. XXX, New York: American Mathematical Society, pp. v+572, ISBN 9780821846216, MR 0024511, Zbl 0033.17002.