Augustin- Louis Cauchy

Augustin-Louis Cauchy, born in 1789, was a French mathematician who published 789 papers and seven books over the course of his lifetime and sculpted elementary calculus limit concepts such as continuity, the derivative and the integral. He is known as a “foremost French mathematician of the nineteenth century.” Augustin-Louis Cauchy was born into a lower-class family one month prior to the French Revolution. His father worked for the government but lost his job after the start of the revolution. He was one of three brothers who also went on to work with the state and mathematics. The family survived the French Revolution by escaping to Arcueil. In Arcueil, Augustin-Louis received his first education from his father. After his family returned to Paris in 1794, Augustin-Louis’ father found work in a bureaucratic position where he was soon promoted to Secretary General of State and working directly under the reputable mathematician of physics, Laplace. In 1802 Augustin-Louis attended the best secondary school in Paris, École Centrale du Pathéon. At École Centrale du Pathéon, he was a talented student and received honors in Latin and Humanities. However, he chose a career in engineering and went on to place second out of 293 applicants to École Polytechnique. He finished at the young age of 18 in 1807 and then went on to the École des Ponts et Chaussées. He graduated with honors with studies in civil engineering. After finishing his studies, Augustin-Louis got a job as a junior engineer in Cherbourg. He stayed there three years, yet continued to work on his genuine passion, Mathematics. During his time working as a civil engineer he produced three mathematical manuscripts, which he submitted; however, only the first two were accepted. Augustin-Louis return to Paris in 1812 and took what is though to be a mental break from his engineering career. During this time he devoted his time strictly to mathematics. In 1816 he was finally appointed into the Académie des Sciences after being rejected three times. He then quit his engineering job and signed a one-year contract as an associate professor, teaching mathematics to second year students. He excelled in this position and went on to become promoted as a full time professor in 1816. During this time, Augustin-Louis was 28 years old and still living with his parents. So his father took the initiative to find his son a suitable bride. Augustin-Louis was then married to Aloïse de Bure in 1818. Together they had two daughters. Due to the intense political climate at the time, Augustin-Louis left his family to go abroad. He first moved to Switzerland in 1830 then to Turin, Italy, as the Chair of theoretical physics from 1831-1832. After his one-year contract in Italy, he went to Prague to tutor the Duke of Bordeaux in science. It wasn’t until 1834 that Augustin-Louis was reunited with his family in Prague. Augustin-Louis and his family returned to Paris in 1838 to the Academy of Science but could not regain teaching positions due to his refusal to take