Minto, Walter, 1753-1796

Walter Minto was one of Princeton's earliest teachers of mathematics, and perhaps the first deserving the designation "mathematician." He was born in the Merse district of Scotland in a family of Spanish origin. He studied philosophy and literature at the University of Edinburgh. Minto was in Pisa Italy, on March 13, 1781, when William Herschel discovered the planet Uranus, which Minto got to see in a telescope. His publications include his treatise RESEARCHES INTO SOME PARTS OF THE THEOTY OF THE PLANETS (1783). Minto sailed to America in 1787, and in the same year he was called to the College of New Jersey (now Princeton University) to succeed Ashbel Green as professor of mathematics and natural philosophy. His inaugural ORATION ON THE PROGRESS AND IMPORTANCE OF THE MATHEMATICAL SCIENCES presented the night before the commencement in 1788, was subsequently published. He became treasurer of the college, and wrote his textbook of mathematics. Minto died at the age of forty two, and was buried in the Princeton (N.J.) cemetery.

Walter Minto was a mathematician and was elected to the American Philosophical Society in 1789.