Alfred Brousseau

Alfred Brousseau (February 17, 1907–May 31, 1988) was an American monk, photographer and mathematician and was known mostly as a founder of the Fibonacci Association and as an educator.

Biography

Brousseau was born in North Beach, San Francisco as one of six children. On August 14, 1920 Brousseau entered the Fratres Scholarum Christianarum and was received as a full member in 1923.

Academic career

In 1924 Brousseau entered St. Mary's College of Moraga, California and in 1926 he began teaching at Sacred Heart High School (Having only High School training). While teaching at St. Marys, Brousseau continued to study and by 1937 he had earned a Physics doctorate from the University of California.

Brousseau continued to teach, and in 1941, was appointed Principal of Sacred Heart High School. By 1959 had returned to St. Mary's College and became Chair of the School of Science. Between this period and 1978, Alfred served both President and Treasurer of the Northern Section of the California Mathematics Council and later as President of the entire State Council.

In 1963, with the American mathematician Verner E. Hoggatt, Brousseau founded the Fibonacci Association with the intention of promoting research into the Fibonacci Numbers and related fields. In 1969 Brousseau commented on the Fibonacci Association (and its associated journal, the "Fibonacci Quarterly") in the April edition of Time Magazine, " "We got a group of people together in 1963, and just like a bunch of nuts, we started a mathematics magazine... [People] tend to find an esthetic satisfaction in it. They think that there's some kind of mystical connection between these numbers and the universe."

Photography

Brousseau was a keen photographer and amassed a collection of in excess of 20,000 color 35mm transparencies recording the native flora of California.

ee also

*Fibonacci Numbers
*The Fibonacci Association
*Verner Emil Hoggatt. Jr

External links

* [http://calphotos.berkeley.edu/brousseau.html Brother Alfred Brousseau, F.S.C.]
* [http://faculty.evansville.edu/ck6/bstud/brousseau.html Brother Alfred Brousseau]
* [http://zipcodezoo.com/photographers/Brother%20Alfred%20Brousseau.aspSelected Selected photographs by Brousseau]