Etta Zuber Falconer
| Etta Zuber Falconer | |
|---|---|
| Born | 1933  Tupelo
|
| Nationality | American |
| Alma mater |
University of Wisconsin–Madison, Fisk University, Emory University
|
| Occupation |
Mathematician, 
|
| Employer |
Spelman College, Norfolk State University
|
Etta Zuber Falconer (1933 – September 18, 2002) was an educator and mathematician who was one of the first African-American women to receive a Ph.D. in mathematics.
Etta Zuber was born in Tupelo, Mississippi, to Walter A. Zuber, a physician, and Zadie L. Montgomery Zuber, a musician. The Zubers had two daughters, with Etta being the younger and Alice the older. While teaching at Okolona Junior College in Okolona, Mississippi, Etta met and married Dolan Falconer, a basketball coach. They had three children – Dolan Falconer Jr., who became a nuclear engineer; Alice Falconer Wilson, a pediatrician; and Walter Zuber Falconer, a urologist. The couple's marriage lasted over 35 years, ended by Dolan's death.
Etta Falconer attended the Tupelo public school system, graduating from George Washington High School in 1949. At the age of 15 she entered Fisk University in Nashville, Tennessee, where she majored in mathematics and minored in chemistry, graduating summa cum laude in 1953. While at Fisk, Falconer was inducted into the Phi Beta Kappa academic honor society.
She went on to study at the University of Wisconsin, where she earned a Master of Science degree in mathematics in 1954. Lonely in Wisconsin, she decided not to pursue her doctorate there and returned to Mississippi to teach. After a 1965 family move to Atlanta, she entered graduate school at Emory University. At Emory she earned a Ph.D. in mathematics in 1969, with a dissertation on abstract algebra.
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