Christine Ladd-Franklin - Graduate Education

Graduate Education

In 1878, Ladd was accepted into Johns Hopkins University with the help of James J. Sylvester, an English mathematician who remembered some of Ladd's earlier works in London's Educational Times. Ladd's application for the University fellowship was signed "C. Ladd", and Hopkins offered the fellowship to her without realizing she was a woman. When they did realize this, the board moved to revoke the offer, but Sylvester insisted that Ladd should be his student, and so she was. She held a fellowship at Hopkins for three years, but the trustees did not allow her name to be printed in circulars with those of other fellows, for fear of setting a precedent. Furthermore, dissension over her continued presence forced one of the original trustees to resign.

Since Hopkins did not approve of coeducation, Ladd was initially allowed only in classes taught by Sylvester. But after displaying exceptional work in Sylvester's courses, Ladd was allowed to take courses with different professors. Even though she was awarded a stipend, she was known as a fellow student. During 1879–1880, Ladd took classes taught by Charles Sanders Peirce, who has been called the first American experimental psychologist. She wrote a dissertation "On the Algebra of Logic" with Peirce as the thesis advisor. The dissertation was published in Studies in Logic (Peirce, ed.) in 1883. Due to her studies with Peirce, Ladd became the first American woman to be involved in psychology, mathematics and logic. Since women were not allowed to graduate at Hopkins, Ladd was refused a Ph.D. in Mathematics and Logic, although she was the first woman to complete all the requirements for a PhD at Hopkins. However, Hopkins officially granted her a Ph.D. in February 22, 1926 (44 years after she had earned it) at the age of seventy-eight.

Soon after completing graduate work at Johns Hopkins, she married Fabian Franklin (a fellow graduate student who received his Ph.D. in mathematics), hence she became Christine Ladd-Franklin. Ladd-Franklin had two children, one of whom died in infancy. The other, Margaret Ladd-Franklin, became a prominent member in the women's suffrage movement.