27 Facts About Issai Schur

Issai Schur was a Russian mathematician who worked in Germany for most of his life.

Issai Schur obtained his doctorate in 1901, became lecturer in 1903 and, after a stay at the University of Bonn, professor in 1919.

Issai Schur is perhaps best known today for his result on the existence of the Schur decomposition and for his work on group representations.

Issai Schur was born into a Jewish family, the son of the businessman Moses Schur and his wife Golde Schur.

Issai Schur was born in Mogilev on the Dnieper River in what was then the Russian Empire.

Issai Schur attended the German-speaking Nicolai Gymnasium in Libau from 1888 to 1894 and reached the top grade in his final examination, and received a gold medal.

In October 1894, Issai Schur attended the University of Berlin, with concentration in mathematics and physics.

Issai Schur thought that his chance of success in the Russian Empire was rather poor, and because he spoke German so perfectly, he remained in Berlin.

Issai Schur graduated in 1903 and was a lecturer at the University of Berlin.

Issai Schur held a position as professor at the Berlin University for the ten years from 1903 to 1913.

The efforts of Frobenius were finally successful in 1916, when Issai Schur succeeded Johannes Knoblauch as adjunct professor.

In 1919 Issai Schur finally received a personal professorship, and in 1921 he took over the chair of the retired Friedrich Hermann Schottky.

Issai Schur remained a member of the Prussian Academy of Sciences after his release as a professor, but a little later he lost this last remnant of his official position.

Issai Schur found himself lonely after the flight of many of his students and the expulsion of renowned scientists from his previous place of work.

Only Dr Helmut Grunsky had been friendly to him, as Issai Schur reported in the late thirties to his expatriate student Max Menachem Schiffer.

Now Issai Schur's wife had inherited a mortgage on a house in Lithuania, which because of the Lithuanian foreign exchange determination could not be repaid.

Issai Schur traveled in the company of a nurse to his daughter in Bern, where his wife followed a few days later.

Issai Schur continued the work of his teacher Frobenius with many important works for group theory and representation theory.

Issai Schur lived in Berlin as a highly respected member of the academic world, an apolitical scholar.

Issai Schur made fundamental contributions to algebra and group theory which, according to Hermann Weyl, were comparable in scope and depth to those of Emmy Noether.

When Issai Schur's lectures were canceled in 1933, there was an outcry among the students and professors who appreciated him and liked him.

Issai Schur was the last Jewish professor who lost his job.

Issai Schur was promised for his guest lecture a fee of CHF 500.

Issai Schur did not reply until 28 January 1936, on which day he was first in the possession of the required approval of the local authority.

In Berlin, meanwhile, mathematician and Nazi Ludwig Bieberbach, in a letter dated 20 February 1936, informed the Reich Minister for Science, Art, and Education on the journey of Issai Schur, and announced that he wanted to find out what was the content of the lecture in Zurich.

Issai Schur had 26 graduate students, some of whom acquired a mathematical reputation.

Issai Schur was known for putting a correct distance in personal affairs.