The Enigmatic Number e: A History in Verse and Its Uses in the Mathematics Classroom - Links to Resources: Biographies and Topics

Biographies

The hyperlinks to biographical information in the poem's text are from the excellent source: J.J. O'Connor and E.F. Robertson, The MacTutor History of Mathematics Archive, University of St. Andrews, Scotland. Additional biographical and historical links are provided below for variety and pedagogical usefulness.

Jacob Bernoulli (1654-1705)
https://mathshistory.st-andrews.ac.uk/Biographies/Bernoulli_Jacob/
http://www.daviddarling.info/encyclopedia/B/Bernoulli.html

Jost Bürgi (1552-1632)
https://mathshistory.st-andrews.ac.uk/Biographies/Burgi/

Leonard Euler (1707-1783)
https://mathshistory.st-andrews.ac.uk/Biographies/Euler/
https://plus.maths.org/frugal-nature-euler-and-calculus-variations

Christian Goldbach (1690-1764)
https://mathshistory.st-andrews.ac.uk/Biographies/Goldbach/

Euler's correspondence with Goldbach: Lettre XV, November 25, 1731
http://eulerarchive.maa.org/correspondence/letters/OO0729.pdf

Charles Hermite (1822-1901)
https://mathshistory.st-andrews.ac.uk/Biographies/Hermite/

Christiaan Huygens (1692-1695)
https://mathshistory.st-andrews.ac.uk/Biographies/Huygens/

Gottfried Leibniz (1646-1716)
https://mathshistory.st-andrews.ac.uk/Biographies/Leibniz/

Nicolaus Mercator (1620-1687)
https://mathshistory.st-andrews.ac.uk/Biographies/Mercator_Nicolaus/

John Napier (1550-1617)
https://mathshistory.st-andrews.ac.uk/Biographies/Napier/
https://plus.maths.org/arithmetic-bones-and-counting

William Oughtred (1574-1660)
https://mathshistory.st-andrews.ac.uk/Biographies/Oughtred/
http://www.sliderulemuseum.com/REF/Oughtred_Aubrey.htm

Gregorius Saint-Vincent (1584-1667)
https://mathshistory.st-andrews.ac.uk/Biographies/Saint-Vincent/

Brook Taylor (1685-1731)
https://mathshistory.st-andrews.ac.uk/Biographies/Taylor/

Topics

Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org) is a rich online source of information about most of the topics mentioned in the poem. Unfortunately, Wikipedia's open-editing policy makes the accuracy of the information on its site uncertain. For this reason we provide links to different online sources. Whenever possible, we have chosen sites where the information is presented with students and educators in mind.

Editors’ note: Please see the poem for links that were updated in April 2026. The URLs below are the original URLs from 2010; many of them are no longer live, but they may (or may not) be accessed through the Wayback Machine of the Internet Archive.

Bernoulli trials
http://www.cut-the-knot.org/Probability/BernoulliTrials.shtml

Calculus
http://math.mit.edu/~djk/calculus_beginners/chapter01/section02.html

Complex numbers
http://www.clarku.edu/~djoyce/complex/

Compound interest
http://plus.maths.org/issue11/features/compound/index.html

Continued fractions
http://www.maths.surrey.ac.uk/hostedsites/R.Knott/Fibonacci/cfINTRO.html#othercfs
http://archives.math.utk.edu/articles/atuyl/confrac/index.html
http://plus.maths.org/issue11/features/cfractions/

Derangements and the Hat-Check Problem
http://www.wmueller.com/precalculus/e/e6.html
http://notaboutapples.wordpress.com/2009/08/03/the-two-decks-of-cards-and-the-drunken-hat-check-girl/

Derivative
http://math.mit.edu/~djk/calculus_beginners/chapter04/section02.html

Differential Equations
http://khanexercises.appspot.com/video?v=-_POEWfygmU
http://www.math-atlas.org/ (click on Differential Equations)

e
http://ja0hxv.calico.jp/pai/ee1value.html (e to 200 billion digits)
http://www.mathpages.com/home/kmath400.htm (irrationality of e)
http://planetmath.org/encyclopedia/EIsTranscendental.html (transcendentality of e)
http://numbers.computation.free.fr/Constants/constants.html (online computation of e)

Euler's Identity
http://www.well.com/~davidu/euler.html
http://users.forthnet.gr/ath/kimon/Euler/Euler.htm

Exponential function
http://mathworld.wolfram.com/ExponentialFunction.html

i (imaginary unit)
http://www.clarku.edu/~djoyce/complex/numberi.html

Integral
http://math.mit.edu/~djk/calculus_beginners/chapter16/section01.html

Irrational numbers
http://www.cut-the-knot.org/do_you_know/numbers.shtml#rational
http://www.daviddarling.info/encyclopedia/I/irrational_number.html

Limit
http://www.coolmath.com/lesson-whats-a-limit-1.htm

Logarithm and natural logarithm (ln)
http://mathworld.wolfram.com/Logarithm.html
http://www.coolmath.com/algebra/17-exponentials-logarithms/09-special-logarithms-02.htm
http://demonstrations.wolfram.com/CalculatingIntegerLogarithmsInDifferentBases/

Number Theory
http://mathworld.wolfram.com/NumberTheory.html
http://www.math-atlas.org/ (click on Number Theory)

Pi (π)
http://www-history.mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/HistTopics/Pi_through_the_ages.html
http://www-history.mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk/HistTopics/Pi_chronology.html

Probability
http://www.cut-the-knot.org/Probability/Dictionary.shtml
http://www.math-atlas.org/ (click on Probability and Statistics)

Rectangular hyperbola
http://mathworld.wolfram.com/RectangularHyperbola.html

Roots of unity
http://www.clarku.edu/~djoyce/complex/powers.html

Series (infinite sums)
http://plus.maths.org/issue19/features/infseries/

Slide rule
http://www.sliderule.ca/intro.htm
http://www.sliderulemuseum.com/?PHPSESSID=52598164a6abd4a522b5ef680a487335
http://demonstrations.wolfram.com/SlideRule/

Taylor series expansion
http://www.math.hmc.edu/calculus/tutorials/taylors_thm/
http://mathworld.wolfram.com/TaylorSeries.html

Transcendental numbers
http://www.daviddarling.info/encyclopedia/T/transcendental_number.html
http://www.cut-the-knot.org/do_you_know/numbers.shtml#algebraic