Quick Facts
Biography
Webster Wells (1851–1916) was an American mathematician known primarily for his authorship of mathematical textbooks.
Early life and career
Webster Wells was born in Boston on September 4, 1851, the son of Thomas Foster Wells (1822–1903) and his wife, Sarah Morrill. Samuel Adams, the Boston brewer and patriot, was a great-great-grandfather. Webster Wells studied at Allen's English and Classical School at West Newton, Massachusetts, then attended the Massachusetts Institute of Technology from which he graduated in 1873 with the degree of Bachelor of Science.
Wells taught mathematics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he was an instructor (1873–1880), and later became successively an assistant professor (1883), an associate professor (1885), and a full professor (1893-1911).
Webster Wells died at Arlington, Massachusetts on May 23, 1916.
Textbooks
Wells' textbooks were used in many schools and colleges in the United States. Among the titles were:
- Elementary Treatise on Logarithms (1878)
- University Algebra (1878)
- Plane and Spherical Trigonometry (1884)
- Plane and Solid Geometry (1887)
- Higher Algebra (1889)
- College Algebra (1890)
- Academic Arithmetic (1893)
- Complete Trigonometry (1900)
- New High School Algebra (1912)