The Late Morris and Miriam Marden and family

Dr. Morris Marden (1905-1991) was a Distinguished Professor Emerita of Mathematics and is generally considered to have been the founder of the Mathematics Department at UWM as a research department, and he is the person most responsible for the beginning of graduate programs at UWM.

Morris Marden was born in East Boston, the fifth son and seventh child of Russian immigrants. At his initiative, he visited Harvard to inquire about independent study in analytic geometry and calculus. He began his studies at the age of 16, financing his education with scholarships, jobs and frugal living, and graduating with the highest honors. He then entered the graduate program while working as a half-time instructor. He earned his PhD in just two years, graduating at the age of 23. He arrived in Milwaukee at 25 in the middle of the Great Depression for a rile as an assistant professor at a two-year branch of the University of Wisconsin.

Sparked by the necessities of war, the 1940s and 1950s universities became increasingly research oriented and Morris grabbed every opportunity he could, including a small Navy project in Brooklyn and as a consultant on compressor and turbine designs at Allis Chalmers Co.

He shepherded the creation of the masters program in math in 1959 and then a PhD program in 1964.

After retiring in 1975, he taught at San Luis Obispo for the next two years, and then returning to Milwaukee teaching part time 1979 to 1982, when his health started to give out.

The Marden’s sons include Albert and Philip. Albert is professor of mathematics and director of the Geometry Center at the University of Minnesota. Philip practices pediatrics in Oconomowoc, Wisconsin.