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Early actuarial work in eighteenth-century Scotland

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 October 2014

J. B. Dow
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Synopsis

The lecture describes how, in 1744, a fund to provide for the widows and children of the Ministers of the Church of Scotland and of the professors of the Scottish Universities came to be established and examines the calculations of an actuarial character on which its provisions were based. Some biographical details are given about the men chiefly responsible for setting up the fund, namely Rev. Robert Wallace, Rev. Alexander Webster and the mathematician Colin Maclaurin. Other work done by Wallace and Webster in the field of population statistics is also outlined.

Type
Research Article
Information
Transactions of the Faculty of Actuaries , Volume 33 , 1971 , pp. 193 - 229
Copyright
Copyright © Institute and Faculty of Actuaries 1971

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References

1.Davidson, A. R., History of the Faculty of Actuaries in Scotland, 1856-1956.Google Scholar
2.Deuchar, D., “Notes on Widows' Funds”. Transactions of the Actuarial Society of Edinburgh, Vol. iii, 61.Google Scholar
3. Alexander Mackie, Facile Princeps, Chap. VIII.Google Scholar
4. This is a quotation from a report issued in 1748 by the Committee appointed to review the progress of the fund. A copy of this report will be found among the records of the fund in the Scottish Record Office.Google Scholar
5. Examples are the essays entitled: “An examination of Mr. Malthus's Doctrines”; “On the originality of Mr. Malthus's Essay”; “Queries relating to the Essay on Population”.Google Scholar
6.SirCraik, Henry, A Century of Scottish History, Vol. 1.Google Scholar
7.Kyd, J. G., Scottish Population Statistics. Scottish History Society, Vol. XLIII 1952.Google Scholar
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9.Boswell, James, Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides with Samuel Johnson Ll.D.Google Scholar
10.Graham, H. G., The Social Life of Scotland in the Eighteenth Century.Google Scholar
11. This correspondence was published by Murray and Cochrane. There is a copy in the National Library of Scotland.Google Scholar