| Authorised form of name | Baker; Henry Frederick (1866 - 1956); mathematician |
| Dates | 1866 - 1956 |
| Nationality | British |
| Place of birth | 1 Clement Court, Cambridge, England |
| Date of birth | 03 July 1866 |
| Place of death | 3 Storeys Way, Cambridge, England |
| Date of death | 17/03/1956 |
| Dates and places | Burial: Parish of the Ascension Burial Ground, Cambridge, England |
| Occupation | mathematician |
| Research field | Geometry |
| Algebraic geometry |
| Mathematics |
| Activity | Education: Perse School, Cambridge; St John's College, Cambridge (MA)
Career: Spent his whole life working in Cambridge, starting as a college lecturer, then as university lecturer (1895-114), holding the special Cayley lectureship (1903–14); and as Lowenden professor of astronomy and geometry (1914–36).
Memberships:
FRAS
London Mathematical Society (President 1910 and 1911)
Medals/ Awards:
Smith's Prize (1889)
De Morgan Medal (1905) |
| Membership category | Fellow |
| Date of election | 09/06/1898 |
| Age at election | 32 |
| Proposer | Percy Alexander MacMahon; Alfred George Greenhill; George Howard Darwin; Arthur Schuster; Micaiah John Muller Hill |
| Andrew Russell Forsyth; James Whitbread Lee Glaisher; William Burnside; William Henry Besant; Ernest William Hobson; Augustus Edward Hough Love |
| Royal Society activity | Medals and prizes:
Sylvester Medal 1910 |
| Relationships | Parents: Henry Baker, a domestic butler, and Sarah Ann Baker, née Britham.
Spouse: 1) Lily Isabella Homfeld Klopp, daughter of Otto Charles Klopp, a merchant, of Homfeld House, Putney, and originally from Leer, Germany (1893); 2) Muriel Irene Woodyard (1885–1956), daughter of Henry Walter Woodyard, an engineer (1903)
Children: Two sons with Lily Isabella Homfelf Klopp, and one daughter with Muriel Irene Woodyard. |
| Published works | RCN 26118
RCN 26119
RCN 26120 |
| General context | Made significant contributions to the theory of functions, differential equations, and continuous groups.
Known as the founder of a vigorous school of geometry. |
| Royal Society Obituary or Memoir | Click to view (may be contained within a meeting notice, presidential address or list of death notices) |
| Related images | Discover a selection of related images in our picture library |
| Image | 
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| Sources | Sources:
Bulloch's Roll; DNB
Obituaries:
Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society 1956 vol 2 pp 49-68, plate, by W V D Hodge
References:
R W Home, 'The Royal Society and the Empire: the colonial and Commonwealth Fellowship. Part 2. After 1847' in NR 2003 vol 57 pp 47-84 |
| Virtual International Authority File | http://viaf.org/viaf/49586356 |
| Royal Society code | NA7577 |
| Reference number | Title | Date |
| EC/1898/03 | Baker, Henry Frederick: certificate of election to the Royal Society | |
| IM/GA/Russell/0 | Baker, Henry Frederick | nd |
| RR/16/71 | Letter from Robert William Frederick Harrison, on a paper 'A generaliziation of the functions xn and gamma (n)' by Reverend F H Jackson to Frederick Henry Baker | 16 April 1904 |
| RR/16/245 | Referee's report by Henry Frederick Baker, on a paper 'The general theory of integration' by Dr William Henry Young | 2 December 1904 |
| RR/35/28 | Referee's report by Henry Frederick Baker, on a paper 'Commentative ordinary differential operations' by J L Burchnell and T W Chaundy | February 1927 |
| RR/17/199 | Referee's report by Henry Frederick Baker, on a paper 'Preliminary note on the operational invariants of a binary quantic' by Percy Alexander MacMahon | [November 1907] |
| NLB/16/596 | Copy letter of a notice from Robert William Frederick Harrison, to [The Times] | 5 May 1898 |
| NLB/23/2/209 | Copy letter from Sir Michael Foster, to Dr Henry Frederick Baker, Fellow of the Royal Society | 3 June 1902 |
| NLB/23/1/717 | Copy letter from Robert William Frederick Harrison, to Henry Frederick Baker, Fellow of the Royal Society | 9 January 1902 |
| NLB/29/283 | Copy letter from Theodore E James, to Dr Henry Frederick Baker, Fellow of the Royal Society | 2 September 1904 |
| NLB/30/121 | Copy letter from Robert William Frederick Harrison, to Dr Henry Frederick Baker, Fellow of the Royal Society | 31 January 1905 |
| NLB/30/283 | Copy letter from Robert William Frederick Harrison, to Dr Henry Frederick Baker, Fellow of the Royal Society | 24 February 1905 |
| NLB/28/598 | Copy letter from Robert William Frederick Harrison, to Dr Henry Frederick Baker, Fellow of the Royal Society | 16 April 1904 |
| NLB/28/662 | Copy letter from Robert William Frederick Harrison, to Henry Frederick Baker, Fellow of the Royal Society | 28 April 1904 |
| NLB/36/157 | Copy letter from Robert William Frederick Harrison, to Dr Henry Frederick Baker, Fellow of the Royal Society | 27 August 1907 |
| NLB/36/209 | Copy letter from Robert William Frederick Harrison, to Dr Henry Frederick Baker, Fellow of the Royal Society | 18 September 1907 |
| NLB/37/716 | Copy letter from Robert William Frederick Harrison to Dr H [Henry] F [Frederick] Baker, Fellow of the Royal Society | 4 May 1908 |
| NLB/46/78 | Copy letter from Robert William Frederick Harrison, to Dr [Henry Frederick] Baker, Fellow of the Royal Society | 6 June 1912 |
| NLB/38/478 | Copy letter from Robert William Frederick Harrison, to Dr Henry Frederick Baker, Fellow of the Royal Society | 10 August 1908 |
| NLB/43/109 | Copy letter from Joseph Larmor, to Dr Henry Frederick Baker, Fellow of the Royal Society | 7 November 1910 |
| NLB/43/309 | Copy letter from Robert William Frederick Harrison, to Dr [Henry Frederick] Baker, Fellow of the Royal Society | 8 December 1910 |
| MC/26/14 | Letter from [Henry Frederick] Baker, 4 Kyneton Terrace, Northumberland, Norfolk, to Mr [Robert] Harrison, the [Royal Society] | 13 September 1911 |
| NLB/47/770 | Copy letter from Robert William Frederick Harrison to Dr H [Henry] F [Frederick] Baker FRS, the Mathematics Committee | 10 April 1913 |
| NLB/52/156 | Copy letter from Robert William Frederick Harrison, Assistant Secretary of the Royal Society; to Professor Henry Frederick Baker, FRS | 28 September 1915 |
| RR/16/240 | Referee's report by Henry Frederick Baker, on a paper 'The convergence of infinite series of analytic functions' by H A Webb | February 1905 |
| RR/16/241 | Referee's report by Henry Frederick Baker and Ernest William Hobson, on a paper 'The convergence of infinite series of analytic functions' by H A Webb | 16 March 1905 |
| RR/17/62 | Referee's report by Henry Frederick Baker, on a paper 'Second memoir on the compositions of numbers' by Percy Alexander MacMahon | [October 1906] |
| RR/22/11 | Referee's report by Edmund Taylor Whittaker, on a paper 'On certain linear differential equations of astronomical interest' by Henry Frederick Baker | June 1915 |
| RR/35/29 | Second referee's report by Henry Frederick Baker, on a paper 'Commentative ordinary differential operations' by J L Burchnell and T W Chaundy | January 1928 |
| RR/33/28 | Referee's report by Henry Frederick Baker, on a paper 'Periodic orbits of the second genus near the straight-line equilibrium points in the problem of three bodies' by Daniel Buchanan | December 1926 |
| NLB/58/827 | Copy letter from James Hopwood Jeans, Secretary of the Royal Society; to Professor [Henry Frederick] Baker, FRS | 23 June 1920 |
| RR/22/4 | Referee's report by Alfred Cardew Dixon, on a paper 'On certain linear differential equations of astronomical interest' by Henry Frederick Baker | August 1915 |
| NLB/68/95 | Copy letter from Francis Alexander Towle, Assistant Secretary of the Royal Society; to Professor [Henry Frederick] Baker, FRS | 9 May 1925 |
| NLB/67/858 | Copy letter from Francis Alexander Towle, Assistant Secretary of the Royal Society; to Professor [Henry Frederick] Baker, FRS | 27 March 1925 |
| NLB/70/99 | Copy letter from Francis Alexander Towle, Assistant Secretary of the Royal Society; to Professor [Henry Frederick] Baker, FRS | 4 January 1927 |
| NLB/71/587 | Copy letter from Francis Alexander Towle, Assistant Secretary of the Royal Society; to the President, Organization Committee of the International Congress of Mathematicians, Bologna [Italy] | 13 July 1928 |
| NLB/72/760 | Copy letter from Francis Alexander Towle, Assistant Secretary of the Royal Society; to Professor [Henry Frederick] Baker, FRS | 7 April 1930 |
| NLB/72/759 | Copy letter from Francis Alexander Towle, Assistant Secretary of the Royal Society; to Professor [Henry Frederick] Baker, FRS | 4 April 1930 |
| IM/Maull/000195 | Baker, Henry Frederick | nd |
| NLB/22/650 | Copy letter from Robert William Frederick Harrison, to [Henry Frederick] Baker, Fellow of the Royal Society | 20 June 1901 |
| NLB/33/716 | Copy letter from Robert William Frederick Harrison, to; Augustus Desire Waller, Lord Avebury [John Lubbock], Sir Benjamin Baker, Dr Henry Frederick Baker, Professor David Ferrier, Professor Sydney John Hickson, Dr A Scott, Mr Albert Charles Seward, Professor William Johnson Sollas, and Professor Silvanus Phillips Thompson, Fellows of the Royal Society | 26 October 1906 |
| RR/19/48 | Referee's report by Henry Frederick Baker, on a paper 'On the foundations of the theory of algebraic functions of one variable' by John Charles Fields | [July 1912] |
| RR/50/68 | Referee's report by Henry Frederick Baker, on a paper 'The kelvin-poincare problem of stellar evolution' by V V Narlikar | May 1933 |
| RR/15/153 | Referee's report by Henry Frederick Baker, on a paper 'A memoir on integral functions' by Ernest William Barnes | 1 February 1902 |
| AP/79/13/1 | Unpublished manuscript, 'On discontinuous fluid motion' by J G [John Gaston] Leathem | 1917 |
| NLB/66/720 | Copy letter from James Hopwood Jeans, Secretary of the Royal Society; to Prof. [Sydney] Chapman | 25 June 1924 |
| NLB/52 | New Letter Book volume 52, copy letters sent from Royal Society administration | 9 July 1915-8 March 1916 |
| RR/16/72 | Referee's report by Henry Frederick Baker, on a paper 'A generaliziation of the functions xn and gamma (n)' by Reverend F H Jackson | 25 May 1904 |
| RR/40/19 | Referee's report by Henry Frederick Baker, on a paper 'The arithmetically reduced indefinite quadratic form in n-variables' by Louis Joel Mordell | December 1930 |
| AP/79/13 | Unpublished paper, 'On discontinuous fluid motion' by J G [John Gaston] Leathem | 1917 |
| RR/16/54 | Referee's report by Henry Frederick Baker, on a paper 'The differential invariants of space' by Andrew Russell Forsyth | August 1903 |
| RR/15/6 | Referee's report by Henry Frederick Baker, on a paper 'The theory of the double gamma function' by Ernest William Barnes | 5 May 1900 |
| RR/15/76 | Referee's report by Henry Frederick Baker, on a paper 'Uber reihen auf der convergenzgrenze' by Emanuel Lasker | June 1900 |
| RR/41/37 | Referee's report by Henry Frederick Baker, on a paper 'Commutative ordinary differential operators. II.—The identity Pn = Qm' by J L Burchnall and T W Chaundy | 23 June 1930 |
| RR/79/199 | Letter from Henry Frederick Baker, on a paper 'The minimum weight design of structural frames' by J Foulkes, to [the Royal Society] | 4 August 1953 |
| RR/79/200 | Letter from Henry Frederick Baker, on a paper 'The minimum weight design of structural frames' by J Foulkes, to [the Royal Society] | 10 August 1953 |
| MC/19/37 | Letter from [Henry Frederick] Baker, St John's College, Cambridge, to [Robert William Frederick] Harrison | 25 April 1904 |
| RR/73/258 | Referee's report by William Vallance Douglas Hodge, on a paper 'On non-commutative algebra and the foundations of projective geometry' by Henry Frederick Baker | 28 October 1950 |
| NLB/38/542 | Copy letter from Joseph Larmor and Sir Archibald Geikie, to Henry Frederick Baker, Fellow of the Royal Society, and others | 16 September 1908 |
| MC/25/14 | Letter from [Henry Frederick] Baker, A New Court, St John's [College], Cambridge, to Mr [Robert] Harrison, [Royal Society] | December 1910 |
| MC/25/213 | Letter from Mary Salter, Romsdal, Torquay, to the [Royal Society] | November 1910 |
| NLB/44/465 | Copy letter from Robert William Frederick Harrison to Dr H [Henry] F [Frederick] Baker FRS | 14 July 1911 |
| MC/26/13 | Letter from [Henry Frederick] Baker, A New Court, St John's College, Cambridge, to Mr [Robert] Harrison, the [Royal Society] | 13 July 1911 |
| NLB/45/768 | Copy letter from Robert William Frederick Harrison to Dr H [Henry] F [Frederick] Baker FRS | 4 May 1912 |
| MC/27/14 | Letter from [Henry Frederick] Baker, St John's College, Cambridge, to the [Royal Society] | 3 May 1912 |
| MC/28/15 | Letter from [Henry Frederick] Baker, St John's College, Cambridge, to Mr [Robert] Harrison, [Royal Society] | 6 December 1913 |
| MC/19 | Volume 19 of miscellaneous correspondence regarding business matters, sent to the Royal Society | 1904 |
| MC/30/8 | Letter from [Henry Frederick] Baker, Walcott, Storey's Way, Cambridge, to the [Royal Society] | 1 February 1915 |
| MC/22/14 | Letter from [Henry Frederick] Baker, St John's College, Cambridge, to The Royal Society | 20 August 1907 |
| MC/22 | Volume 22 of miscellaneous correspondence regarding business matters, sent to the Royal Society | 1907 |