19 Facts About Douglas Hartree

Douglas Hartree's father, William, was a lecturer in engineering at the University of Cambridge.

Douglas Hartree was the oldest of three sons who survived infancy.

Douglas Hartree attended St Faith's School in Cambridge, then Bedales School, returning to Cambridge for his degree studies at St John's College, Cambridge, which the first World War interrupted.

Douglas Hartree derived the Hartree equations for the distribution of electrons in an atom and proposed the self-consistent field method for their solution.

In 1929, Douglas Hartree was appointed to the Beyer Chair of Applied Mathematics at the University of Manchester.

Douglas Hartree spent the rest of the decade applying the differential analyser to find solutions of differential equations arising in physics, including control theory and laminar boundary layer theory in fluid dynamics, making significant contributions to each of the fields.

In 1935, his father, William Douglas Hartree, offered to do calculations for him.

Douglas Hartree recognised the importance of configuration interaction that he referred to as "superposition of configurations".

Douglas Hartree never published any of his magnetron research findings in journals though he wrote numerous highly technical secret reports during the war.

Douglas Hartree became acquainted with drafts of von Neumann's famous June 1945 EDVAC report.

About two months later Douglas Hartree went over to see ENIAC, not then publicly known.

Douglas Hartree recommended the grant but Darwin opposed it on the grounds that Turing's ACE at NPL would be sufficient to serve the needs of the country.

Douglas Hartree did further work in control systems and was involved in the early application of digital computers, advising the US military on the use of ENIAC for calculating ballistics tables.

Douglas Hartree worked closely with Wilkes in developing use of the machine for a wide range of problems and, most importantly, showed users from a number of areas in the university how they could use it in their research work.

Douglas Hartree returned to Cambridge to take up the post of Plummer professor of mathematical physics in 1946.

Herman Goldstine at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton who wrote to Douglas Hartree telling him of their search.

Outside of his professional life, Douglas Hartree was passionate about music, having an extensive knowledge of orchestral and chamber music.

Douglas Hartree played piano and was conductor of an amateur orchestra.

Douglas Hartree died of heart failure in Addenbrooke's Hospital, Cambridge, on 12 February 1958.