Clifford A. Truesdell III grew up in California and went to the Polytechnic High School from which he graduated in 1936. As a young child he was quite interested in art and
poetry and these interests did not fade with age. He was also interested in learning different languages and was able to gain proficiency in Latin, Ancient Greek, German,
French, and Italian by travelling in Europe for two years after graduating high school. After returning from Europe, Truesdell attended the California Institute of Technology
where he received a BS in both physics and mathematics in 1941, as well as his MS in mathematics in 1942. He then received his PhD in Mathematics from Princeton University
in 1943. Truesdell’s longest held position was as Professor of Rational Mechanics at Johns Hopkins University, where he worked from 1961-1989.
Much of Truesdell’s work was in the area of continuum mechanics, but he also made substantial contributions to the following areas: thermodynamics, elasticity, fluid mechanics,
kinetic theory of gases, statistical mechanics, and more. Much of his foundational theoretical work on “simple fluid theory” is described in his book written with K. R. Rajagopal,
An Introduction to the Mechanics of Fluids, and greatly impacted future developments in rheology. His initial work was greatly influenced by his mentor Harry Bateman
from Caltech. He contributed to founding the field of rational mechanics which aims to construct a self-consistent mathematical model for treating observable mechanical phenomena
from a set of basic axioms and principles.
Truesdell was a very well-rounded scholar and polymath. He not only contributed to science but was also a historian of science; he co-edited six volumes on collections of
Euler’s work. He also founded the Archive for Rational Mechanics and Analysis and the Archive for History of Exact Sciences for science writing and
co-founded the Society for Natural Philosophy.
Sources
Ball, J.M., James, R.D, Eds. The Scientific Life and Influence of Clifford Ambrose Truesdell III. Arch. Rational Mech. Anal. 2002, 161(1), 1-26.
Go to HTML link;
go to PDF link.
O’Connor, J. J.; Robertson, E. F. Clifford Ambrose Truesdell III. MacTutor History of Mathematics archive, July 2011.
Go to link.
Robinson, Sara. Clifford Truesdell, 80, Master of 2 Disciplines of Mechanics. The New York Times, January 22, 2000, A00013.
Go to link.
Photo Credit
Truesdell Clifford A3, AIP Emilio Segrè Visual Archives.