Jacob Struve

Who was Jacob Struve?

Jacob Struve was a German mathematician and father of the astronomer Friedrich Georg Wilhelm von Struve.

Jacob Struve was born in 1755, in Horst, Holstein. He was the youngest of the four children of Johann Struve and Abel Strüven. From the young age he had to work in the fields, but he also received lessons in Latin, German, English and in mathematics, which he liked most. From 1771 till 1775 he studied the Christianeum High School in Altona, then part of both Denmark and Germany. Starting from 1775, he entered the University of Göttingen and attended mathematics lectures of Abraham Gotthelf Kästner, which were rather popular among students, including Struve. In 1780, through the assistance of one of his teachers, Christian Gottlob Heyne, Struve obtained a position of vice-principal in a Latin school in Hanover. In 1783, he became a school principal in Bückeburg and from 1784 held the same position in Hanover. In 1783, Struve married Maria Emerentia Wiese from Hamburg. They had five sons and two daughters: