Object Details
maker
Baker, Richard P.
Description
This model is one of several hundred designed by Richard P. Baker, a mathematics faculty member at the University of Iowa. It has a black wooden base with a plaster surface atop it. The sides of the plaster are painted black, the top is white. A typed paper tag attached to the sides reads at least in part: 426 (/) Potential surface z = (/) [log (x-1)2 + y2] + log [(x+1)2 + y2].
According to documents in the accession file, it is fact the surface associated with the function: z = log ((x-1) 2 + y2) + log ((x+1) 2 +y2) - log (x2 + y2).
Baker apparently made the model late in his career – it is not listed in the 1931 printed version of his catalog, but an annotation of the copy of the catalog in the accession file for the Baker collection lists it on p. 19 as a model for mathematical physics. Other annotations give the full equation represented.
The model was lent by the Baker family for exhibition at MIT in 1939 and came to the Smithsonian in 1956.
Reference:
Accession file 211257.
Location
Currently not on view
Credit Line
Gift of Frances E. Baker
date made
1931-1935
1925-1935
ca 1906-1935
ID Number
MA.211257.078
accession number
211257
catalog number
211257.078
Object Name
geometric model
Physical Description
plaster (overall material)
wood (overall material)
white (overall color)
black (overall color)
plaster cast, bolted to base. (overall production method/technique)
Measurements
average spatial: 8.4 cm x 14.3 cm x 14.3 cm; 3 5/16 in x 5 5/8 in x 5 5/8 in
See more items in
Medicine and Science: Mathematics
Science & Mathematics
Data Source
National Museum of American History
Subject
Mathematics
Link to Original Record
Record ID
nmah_1086173