Young Donald MacAlister - Senior Wrangler at Cambridge in 1877

Sir Donald MacAlister of Tarbert (1854-1934) physician, principal and vice-chancellor and, later, chancellor of the university of Glasgow Donald MacAlister (1854-1934) the Senior Wrangler at Cambridge University in 1877. ... Donald MacAlister (1854-1934) the Senior Wrangler at Cambridge University in 1877. ...

Donald MacAlister was born in Perth, Scotland. He was a native speaker of Gaelic. He rose in life from humble beginnings via school at the Liverpool Institute for Boys (founded 1825, closed 1985) to become Senior Wrangler (top mathematician) at Cambridge University in 1877. In November 1877 he was elected a fellow of St. John's College, Cambridge. He remained a fellow until the end of his life, and was senior tutor from 1900 to 1904. In 1879 he published a paper in the Proceedings of the Royal Society on "The Law of the Geometric Mean." The work was in response to a question put by Francis Galton and contains what is now called the log-normal distribution. Location within the British Isles. ... The Liverpool Institute for Boys was founded in 1825, but occupied other premises while the money was found to build a dedicated building. ... At the University of Cambridge in England, a wrangler is a student who has completed the third year (called Part II) of the mathematical tripos with first-class honours. ... The University of Cambridge is the second-oldest university in the English-speaking world (after Oxford). ... Full name The College of Saint John the Evangelist of the University of Cambridge Motto - Named after The Hospital of Saint John the Evangelist, Cambridge, named after John the Evangelist Previous names - Established 1511 Sister College Balliol College Master Prof. ... Francis Galton Sir Francis Galton FRS (February 16, 1822 - January 17, 1911) was an English explorer, statistician, anthropologist, creator of modern eugenics (he coined the term), and investigator of the human mind. ... In probability and statistics, the log-normal distribution is the probability distribution of any random variable whose logarithm is normally distributed (the base of the logarithmic function is immaterial in that loga X is normally distributed if and only if logb X is normally distributed). ...

After a spell teaching mathematics at Harrow School, MacAlister returned to his original intention of studying medicine, first at Cambridge, later in 1879 at St. Bartholomew's Hospital, and for a short time at Leipzig. In 1881 he settled in Cambridge, and took up medical teaching, investigation, and practice, and in 1884, when he graduated M.D., of physician to Addenbrooke's Hospital. He was elected F.R.C.P. in 1886. Harrow School Chapel Harrow School is a British public school, located in Harrow on the Hill, in North West London. ... Addenbrookes Hospital is a large teaching hospital in Cambridge. ...

MacAlister was a contemporary at St. John's of the first Japanese graduate of Cambridge named Kikuchi Dairoku and they were lifelong friends. MacAlister also assisted Inagaki Manjiro with a petition to the Council of the Senate to allow Japanese students to obtain exemption from the study of Latin and Greek for entrance examinations. Kikuchi Dairoku as a professor at Tokyo Imperial University Dairoku Kikuchi (Born March 17, 1855 - Died August 19, 1917) (or in the Japanese order Kikuchi Dairoku, 菊池大麓) was born in Edo, the second son of Mitsukuri Shuhei. ... Inagaki Manjiro from Nagasaki Ken Jibutsu Den Inagaki Manjiro (稲垣 満次郎 Inagaki Manjirō; born 1861; died 1908) was a Japanese diplomat. ... The Council of the Senate is the name for the governing body of Cambridge University. ...

Donald MacAlister was later principal of Glasgow University, 1907-29. See here. The University of Glasgow is the largest of the three universities in Glasgow, Scotland. ... The following List of Alumni and Faculty of the University of Glasgow provides a selection of the well known people who have studied or taught at the University of Glasgow since its inception in 1451. ...

Reference

• MacAlister, Edith F.B. Sir Donald MacAlister of Tarbert, London, 1935

• Japanese Students at Cambridge University in the Meiji Era, 1868-1912: Pioneers for the Modernization of Japan (http://www.dhs.kyutech.ac.jp/~ruxton/hatenkou.html), by Noboru Koyama, translated by Ian Ruxton, (Lulu Press (http://www.lulu.com/content/71869), September 2004, ISBN 1411612566)