Gustav Plarr

Abstract

ONE of the older generation of mathematicians has lately passed away in the person of Dr. Gustav Plarr, who died at Tonbridge on January 11, of bronchitis following influenza. He was born on August 27,1819, at Kupferhammer, a country house near Strasburg. He was educated at the Gymnase and at the University in that city, whence he proceeded to Paris University, where he obtained his diplomas as Licentiate of Sciences and as “Docteur és Sciences Mathéematiques.”Among his close friends at school and at the University was M. Wurtz, while M. Gerhardt, another great chemist, was among his Strasburg contemporaries. Dr. Plarr for some time meditated a life of chemical research, but found that his health would not permit of prolonged laboratory work. After taking his doctorial degree, he was for some time mathematical master at a College at Colmar, and, on the Chair of Mathematics becoming vacant in the University of Strasburg, was one of the candidates for the post. He was strongly supported by the Strasburg academic party, especially by M. Sarrusr the outgoing Professor, but clerical influences were at work against him, and a Parisian was finally imposed on the little Germanizing University.