Louis Charles Karpinski

Louis Charles Karpinski (5 August 1878 – 25 January 1956) was an American mathematician born in Rochester, New York to Henry Hermanagle Karpinski from Warsaw, Poland and Mary Louise Engesser from Guebweiler, Alsace. He was educated at Cornell University and in Europe at Strassburg.

He also studied (1909–1910) at Columbia, where he was a fellow and a university extension lecturer. He taught at Berea College and at Oswego, New York at the Normal School there, then accepted a position at the University of Michigan where in 1919 he became full professor of mathematics. Dr. Karpinski devoted his attention chiefly to the history and pedagogy of mathematics.

An authority on the history of science, he was collaborator on the Archivo di Storia della Scienza and author of The Hindu-Arabic Numerals, with David Eugene Smith (1911), Robert of Chester's Latin Translation of the Algebra of Al-Khowarizmi (1915), andUnified Mathematics, with H. Y. Benedict and J. W. Calhoun (1913), and subsequently produced other publications. He served as the president of the History of Science Society from 1943–44.

• The Hindu-Arabic Numerals (with David Eugene Smith). Boston: Ginn and Company, 1911.
• Robert of Chester's Latin Translation of the Algebra of Al-Khowarizmi, with an Introduction, Critical Notes and an English Version. New York: Macmillan Co., 1915.
• Unified Mathematics (with Harry Y. Benedict and John W. Calhoun). Boston: D.C. Heath and Company, 1918 and 1922.
• The History of Arithmetic. Chicago: Rand McNally and Co., 1925.
• Bibliography of the Printed Maps of Michigan, 1804–1880. Lansing: Michigan Historical Commission, 1931.
• Historical Atlas of the Great Lakes and Michigan. Lansing: Michigan Historical Commission, 1931.
• Bibliography of Mathematical Works Printed in America through 1850. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1940.