Dr. Christine Ladd-Franklin
Wesleyan Academy Class of 1865

      Her obituary, from the New York Times March 6, 1930 paints Dr. Ladd-Franklin as a remarkable scientist and a formidable person.
      Dr. Christine Ladd-Franklin, one of the leading American scientists of her sex, distinguished as psychologist, logician and mathematician, whose career had an important influence in opening to women opportunities for the highest education, died March 5, after a week’s illness of pneumonia at her residence, 417 Riverside Drive, in her eighty-third year. She is survived by her husband, Fabian Franklin, former Professor of Mathematics at Johns Hopkins University and former associate editor of the New York Evening Post; and by a daughter Margaret Franklin, author of “The Case for Woman Suffrage: a Bibliography.”
      The former Christine Ladd was born at Windsor, Conn., a daughter of Eliphalet and Augusta Niles Ladd. Her great-uncle, William Ladd, founded the American Peace Society and left his fortune to it. Another great-uncle, John Milton Niles, was Postmaster General under Van Buren and twice U. S. Senator. Six of her maternal ancestors were members of the Constitutional Conventions of the Colony of Connecticut.

Graduated at Wilbraham 1865
      Mrs. Franklin received her full college preparation at Wilbraham (sic) Academy from which she graduated in 1865, as valedictorian. In her class at Wilbraham were the late Caleb T. Winchester, for half a century professor of English at Wesleyan University, the late George Edward Reed, for many years president of Dickinson College, and the late Bernard Moses, famous political economist on the faculty of the University of California.

Graduated at Vassar in 1869
      The founding of Vassar College inspired her to take advantage of this new opportunity for the intellectual advancement of women. She was graduated in 1869 from Vassar, having devoted herself particularly to astronomy and physics. She wanted to continue her work in physics, but owing to the impossibility of women obtaining access to a laboratory, she turned to mathematics, which needs no apparatus.
      Certain published articles of hers on mathematical subjects made such a favorable impression on Professor Sylvester, the English mathematician who became the first professor of that subject at Johns Hopkins in 1876, that when two years later she applied for admission to the university, he strongly supported her application, although the university was closed to women. The question of the merit of her published work as bearing on her admissibility was referred to her future husband, Fabian Franklin, then a young instructor at the university. He gave a favorable report. Professor Sylvester insisted on her admission and had his way. Miss Ladd proved such a worthy student that a fellowship in mathematics for three successive years was awarded to her.
      Yet the final result of Dr. Ladd-Franklin’s work at Johns Hopkins was to lead her into two other fields in which she attained eminence as an investigator – logic and the theory of color vision. Her contribution to the study of the syllogism was thus referred to by Josiah Royce of Harvard: “It is rather remarkable that the crowning activity in a field worked over since the days of Aristotle should be the achievement of an American woman.” Her improvement on the ordinary doctrine of the syllogism consisted in the addition of a companion-piece called the antilogism. In Germany it is known as die Ladd-Franklin’sche Formel.
      Part of Dr. Ladd-Franklin’s researches in the theory of vision were carried out at Gottingen and Berlin. At Gottingen, where women were rigidly excluded from the university, Professor G. E. Muller repeated his lectures to her alone. Her work there and the aid engendered from Professor Muller helped open the doors of German universities to women a few years later.

Develops Color-Vision Theory
      At Berlin Dr. Ladd-Franklin was permitted to carry on experimental work in the laboratory of Helmholtz and to attend the lectures of Professor Koenig. There she developed her theory of color-vision and although advancing an opposite opinion, she gained the highest respect of Helmholtz. In 1924 she contributed an appendix to Helmholtz’s monumental work on “Physiological Optics.” Her story of color-vision, published in 1892, is known by her name, and is widely accepted here and abroad.
      From 1904 to 1909 Dr. Ladd-Franklin lectured on logic and philosophy at Johns Hopkins, and from 1910 until the beginning of her fatal illness she lectured on these subjects at Columbia, in addition to her independent writing and research. Vassar College awarded her the degree of Doctor of Laws in 1887 and Johns Hopkins made her a Doctor of Philosophy in 1926.

reprinted from The Academy, Fall 2003