Mary Boas

Who is Mary Boas?

Mary Layne Boas was an American mathematician and physics professor best known as the author of Mathematical Methods in the Physical Sciences, an undergraduate textbook that is still widely used in college classrooms in 2010.

She received a Bachelor's degree and a Master's degree in mathematics from the University of Washington, and in 1948 she earned a PhD degree in physics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She taught in the Physics Department of DePaul University in Chicago for 30 years, retiring in 1987 to return to Washington.

In 2005, at the age of 88, Mary Boas published the third edition of her textbook. She established the Mary L. Boas Endowed Scholarship at the University of Washington in 2008 to recognize outstanding academic achievements by female students in the Department of Physics.

Mary Boas was married to mathematician Ralph P. Boas, Jr. Her son, Harold P. Boas, is also a noted mathematician. She died on February 17, 2010, at her home near Seattle, Washington.