“Increasing the Utility of the Society”: The Colloquium Lectures of the American Mathematical Society

Abstract

This study traces the creation—in 1896—and evolution—through the outbreak of World War II—of the Colloquium lecture series of the American Mathematical Society (AMS). It documents how this innovation fostered a new sort of mathematical exchange and, in so doing, allowed the AMS to serve more effectively both as an agent of research-level mathematical communication and as a more truly national mathematical organization.