Edgar William Middlemast (born 1864) was a British mathematician and educator in India in the early twentieth century. He served as the Deputy Director of the Department of Public Instruction, Madras Presidency

Madras Presidency

The Madras Presidency , officially the Presidency of Fort St. George and also known as Madras Province, was an administrative subdivision of British India...

, as Professor of Mathematics at the Presidency College, Madras from 1910 and as Principal

Principal (academia)

The Principal is the chief executive and the chief academic officer of a university or college in certain parts of the Commonwealth.-Canada:...

 of the college in 1915.

Early life and education

Middlemast was born to Edward William Middlemast of Northumberland

Northumberland

Northumberland is the northernmost ceremonial county and a unitary district in North East England. For Eurostat purposes Northumberland is a NUTS 3 region and is one of three boroughs or unitary districts that comprise the "Northumberland and Tyne and Wear" NUTS 2 region...

, a provision dealer, and his wife Margaret at Wallsend on December 9, 1864; he was baptised on April 16, 1865. He had his schooling at the Royal Grammar School, Newcastle-on-Tyne and studied at St John's College, Cambridge

St John's College, Cambridge

St John's College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. The college's alumni include nine Nobel Prize winners, six Prime Ministers, three archbishops, at least two princes, and three Saints....

 between 1882 and 1886. Middlemast was placed tenth wrangler in the Mathematical tripos, Part I in 1886.

Career

Middlemast was appointed Professor of the Madras Engineering College in September 1888 and served till March 1897, when he was appointed Principal of the Rajahmundry College. In July 1903, Middlemast was appointed Deputy Director of Public Instruction in the Madras Presidency

Madras Presidency

The Madras Presidency , officially the Presidency of Fort St. George and also known as Madras Province, was an administrative subdivision of British India...

. Middlemast was deputed to Holland by the government in 1904, to review the education system in the country. In July 1905, he was appointed fellow

Fellow

A fellow in the broadest sense is someone who is an equal or a comrade. The term fellow is also used to describe a person, particularly by those in the upper social classes. It is most often used in an academic context: a fellow is often part of an elite group of learned people who are awarded...

 of Madras University.

Middlemast was appointed Professor of Mathematics at the Presidency College, Madras in 1910, and served as its Principal in 1915. He also served as an Inspector of schools from 1910 to 1915. Middlemast was the President of the Indian Mathematical Society

Indian Mathematical Society

Indian Mathematical Society is the oldest organization in India devoted to the promotion of study and research in mathematics. The Society was founded in April 1907 by V. Ramaswamy Aiyer with its head-quarters at Pune. The Society started its activities under the name Analytic Club and the name...

 in 1915.

Ramanujan

On 21 September 1911, Middlemast wrote the following letter of recommendation for a then unknown youth named Srinivasa Ramanujan

Srinivasa Ramanujan

Srīnivāsa Aiyangār Rāmānujan FRS, better known as Srinivasa Iyengar Ramanujan was a Indian mathematician and autodidact who, with almost no formal training in pure mathematics, made extraordinary contributions to mathematical analysis, number theory, infinite series and continued fractions...

, who was applying for the position of Clerk at the Madras Port Trust.

Letter of Recommendation
Madras

21 September 1911

I can strongly recommend the applicant. He is a young man of quite exceptional capacity in Mathematics and especially in work relating to numbers. He has a natural aptitude for computation and is very quick at figure work. Though he has had no experience of statistical work, I am confident that he can pick up the details in a very short time.

E. W. Middlemast

Acting Principal and Professor of Mathematics

The Presidency College.

According to S. Narayanan, who in 1957 was a retired mathematics lecturer in Madura College, Madura, Middlemast's first impression of Ramanujan was not so favourable. Narayanan, who had met Ramanujan in 1907, reminisced some 50 years later:

My brother-in-law, N. Swaminathan, while studying in the SPG College, Trichinopoly in the BA classes used to tell me that a young smart Aiyangar youth was loitering about, amidst the students at Trichinopoly talking about the Taylor's in the Differential Calculus and its universal applicability. Since then, I was longing to meet him. At last, about the year 1907, in the company of the late Prof. V. Ramaswami Aiyar, the founder of the Indian Mathematical Society, the late Mr. S. Narayana Aiyar, MA, Chief Accountant, Madras Port Trust Office and myself (then Mathematics Lecturer, Presentation Convent College, George Town, Madras), Ramanujam came to us, one fine morning with a quarto size, 400 pages bound note book, in his hand and handed it over to us for perusal and opinion. We went through its pages carefully. They contained only a string qf his mathematical researches, numbering 2276, 2277, 2278 and so on. We could not make out the relation between one result and the successive one, even after an hour's explanation by him. He was not conversant with our mathematical terms and conventions but he went on in his own queer way. We realized that he must be a mathematical genius whose depth could not be measured by us and at once directed him to Prof. Middlemast, the then Principal and Professor of Mathematics in the Presidency College. He went through the pages of the note book for a few minutes and brushed it aside as "Nonsense." We then persuaded Narayana Aiyar to take him to Sir FJE Spring (The Engineer who constructed the Ganges Bridge) who was the Chief Engineer and President, Madras Port Trust. He was struck with the personality of Ramanujam and provided him with a Time-Keeper's Place in his office on a salary Rs. 40/- per mensem leaving instructions to the Manager, not to give Ramanujam any hard work and but just to keep him on, leaving him to continue his mathematical researches in the office.

Narayanan goes on to say:

Meanwhile, he held correspondence with Prof. Hardy, of Cambridge for the purpose of verifying whether Ramanujam's results were really valuable and for this purpose, about a dozen mathematical results of Ramanujam were sent by Mr. Spring to Prof. Hardy. Meanwhile about the year 1907 or thereabouts, Prof. EH Neville of Cambridge paid a visit to Madras. We, then in consultation with the then other resident members of the Indian Mathematical Society arranged for a tea-party in honor of Mr. Neville in the Presidency College, under the auspices of the Indian Mathematical Society. We had arranged that Ramanujam should read a paper. He chose for his subject (Elliptic Functions). At the close of the Tea party, Ramanujam read his paper. At the outset, he gave his own definition of Elliptic Function and in a few minutes explained and arrived at the Modular Transformations in Elliptic functions, which took a whole life for Prof. Cayley to formulate. Mr. Neville was struck with it and promised to do something on his return to Cambridge. By this time, Mr. Spring's letter had its effect and synchronised with Neville's with the result that Ramanujam was to be sent to Cambridge. But being orthodox, he would not easily go. It was R. Ramachandra Rao, then Collector of Kurnool, that took great pains in persuading Ramanujam's mother to permit her son to go to England. The rest is the life sketch of Ramanujam. I may add that R. Ramachandra Rao, spent a lot of his private money, incognito, to support Ramanujam. I was in close contact with him, I have often dined in his house and he, in mine. During conversation, he used to fall into religious trances, crying out "Oh, Goddess Namagiri!"