John Archibald Venn (10 November 1883 – 15 March 1958) was a British

economist An economist is a professional and practitioner in the social science discipline of economics. The individual may also study, develop, and apply theories and concepts from economics and write about economic policy. Within this field there are ...

. He was President of

Queens' College, Cambridge Queens' College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Queens' is one of the oldest colleges of the university, founded in 1448 by Margaret of Anjou. The college spans the River Cam, colloquially referred to as the "light s ...

, from 1932 until his death, Vice-Chancellor of Cambridge University 1941–1943, university archivist, and author, with his father, of ''

Alumni Cantabrigienses ''Alumni Cantabrigienses: A Biographical List of All Known Students, Graduates and Holders of Office at the University of Cambridge, from the Earliest Times to 1900'' is a biographical register of former members of the University of Cambridge whic ...

''. His father was logician

John Venn John Venn, Fellow of the Royal Society, FRS, Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of London, FSA (4 August 1834 – 4 April 1923) was an English mathematician, logician and philosopher noted for introducing Venn diagrams, which are used in l ...

(the creator of the

Venn diagram A Venn diagram is a widely used diagram style that shows the logical relation between set (mathematics), sets, popularized by John Venn (1834–1923) in the 1880s. The diagrams are used to teach elementary set theory, and to illustrate simple ...

). Venn was educated at

Eastbourne College Eastbourne College is a co-educational independent school in the British public school tradition, for day and boarding pupils aged 13–18, in the town of Eastbourne on the south coast of England. The College's headmaster is Tom Lawson. Over ...

and

Trinity College, Cambridge Trinity College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Founded in 1546 by Henry VIII, King Henry VIII, Trinity is one of the largest Cambridge colleges, with the largest financial endowment of any college at either Cambridge ...

. He took his honours in the History Tripos in 1904–1905. During the

First World War World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

he was a lieutenant for three years in the

Cambridgeshire Regiment The Cambridgeshire Regiment was an infantry regiment of the British Army, and was part of the Territorial Army. Originating in units of rifle volunteers formed in 1860, the regiment served in the Second Anglo-Boer War and the First and Secon ...

and then served as a statistician in the Food Production Department. He served on the Scientific Council of the

International Institute of Agriculture The International Institute of Agriculture (IIA) was founded in Rome in 1905 by the King of Italy Victor Emmanuel III with the intent of creating a clearinghouse for collection of agricultural statistics. It was created primarily due to the efforts ...

and many other Departmental committees of the Ministry of Agriculture. Venn was elected a Fellow in 1927 and had been a Junior Fellow and Bursar at Queens' before being elected president on the death of Thomas Cecil Fitzpatrick in 1932. At the time he was the youngest Head of a college in Cambridge. He was also the Gilbey Lecturer in Agriculture. The Guyanese writer Arthur Seymour was visiting Venn in the Queens' College Presidential Lodge when Venn showed Seymour the proofs of ''Alumni Cantabrigienses''. Thirty years later the memory of seeing these proofs inspired Seymour to propose the creation of a ''Guyana National Encyclopedia'' modelled on the Australian National Encyclopedia. Although Seymour failed to gain financial support for the project, Venn's example did inspire Seymour to publish two volumes of the ''Dictionary of Guyanese Biography'' which were published in 1984 and 1986.

References

* "VENN, John Archibald", ''Who Was Who'', A & C Black, 1920–2008; online edn, Oxford University Press, Dec 200
accessed 19 Dec 2011
* "Dr J Venn Elected President", The Times (London, England), Monday, Mar 14, 1932

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Venn, John Archibald 1883 births 1958 deaths British economists Fellows of Queens' College, Cambridge Presidents of Queens' College, Cambridge Vice-Chancellors of the University of Cambridge Companions of the Order of St Michael and St George Alumni of Trinity College, Cambridge Cambridgeshire Regiment officers British Army personnel of World War I