Andrew Gray

Who was Andrew Gray?

Andrew Gray FRS FRSE was a Scottish physicist and mathematician.

Born in Lochgelly, Fife, the son of John Gray, he was educated at Lochgelly School and studied at the University of Glasgow, where he was appointed the Eglinton Fellow in Mathematics in 1876. Perhaps more significantly, however, in 1875 he became the assistant and private secretary of Professor William Thomson. He held this post – an official University one after 1880 – until 1884, when he was appointed Professor of Physics at the newly founded University College of North Wales.

In June 1896 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society

He remained in Bangor until 1899, when he returned to Glasgow to become the Professor of Natural Philosophy, succeeding Kelvin on his retirement. He held this chair for twenty-four years, stepping down in 1923, shortly before his death.