Eva Hartree

Hartree was born Eva Rayner in Stockport in 1873, the daughter of a Jewish doctor, Edwin Rayner and his wife Isabella.[2][3][4]

Hartree read natural history at Girton College, Cambridge from 1892, completing tripos in 1895, but not graduating as women did not then proceed to graduation.[2] Also in 1895 she married William Hartree, a lecturer in engineering.[2] She was a suffragist (not a more militant suffragette).[2]

Hartree was a Borough Councillor from 1921 to 1927, during which time she was the first woman to be Mayor of Cambridge in 1924–25.[2] As a result of suffering from Graves' disease, she had a short period off the council, but was again a Councillor from 1929 to 1943.[2] Hartree was President of the National Council of Women of Great Britain in 1933.[5] After her husband died in 1943, she resigned from the council and moved to London, to work with refugees.[5]

The Hartrees had six children, only two of whom survived beyond infancy, and only one of those two to adulthood.[2] The surviving son was Douglas Rayner Hartree, who became Plummer Professor of Mathematical Physics.[2] Her niece through her brother Edwin, (who became a senior figure at the National Physical Laboratory) was geologist Dorothy Helen Rayner.[6][7] The Hartrees lived at 21 Bentley Road, Trumpington.[8] During the time after William Hartree died and Eva Hartree lived in London, the house was occupied by the scientist John Baker.[8]

Her husband died in 1943, and Hartree herself died in 1947.[2]

The Clay Farm community centre in Trumpington has an Eva Hartree Hall.[9] Her photographic portrait in mayoral robes by Olive Edis is held by the National Portrait Gallery.[10]