Carolyn Mahoney

Dr. Carolyn Mahoney is the sixth Black individual—and the second Black woman—to graduate from Ohio State with a PhD in mathematics. From the time she entered Mount St. Scholastica College to the time she retired from Lincoln University, Dr. Carolyn Mahoney has been a role model, advocate and champion for female mathematicians.

Dr. Mahoney was born on December 22, 1946 in Memphis, Tennessee to Stephen and Myrtle Boone. As the sixth of thirteen siblings, she grew up in a hectic household. Whenever Dr. Mahoney managed to snag some precious free time, she spent it solving math puzzles. “I always loved mathematics,” Mahoney recounts during an interview with biographer Wini Warren. “I can remember dreaming about solutions to math problems in eighth grade."

As Mahoney grew, so did her love for math. She attended Father Bertrand Catholic High School, where nuns encouraged her mathematical pursuits. One teacher in particular, Sister Mary Kilian, B.V.M. even arranged scholarships for Mahoney, for she “had no doubt that [Mahoney] would do well in college.”

Over the next 19 years, Mahoney proved Sister Kilian right. She went on to study at Mount St. Scholastica college in Atchison, Kansas, where Sister Malackey Kennedy, O.S.B. mentored Mahoney. For her last year of undergraduate studies, Mahoney transferred to Sienna College back in Memphis, Tennessee. By the spring of 1970, she graduated Summa Cum Laude with a Bachelor of Science degree in Mathematics.

Mahoney decided to shift gears for her master’s degree. While her Catholic all-female colleges treated her well, she decided to change things up and apply to a public research institution: The Ohio State University. With the help of Department of Mathematics chair Arnold Ross, Mahoney found herself sitting in an Ohio State classroom by the fall of 1970, listening to her professors explain combinatorics and graph theory. She remembers being one of the few (if not the only) Black women pursuing their master’s at OSU. “I was essentially a foriegn student [in graduate school] as most of my friends were Canadian or Chinese,” Mahoney explains. “I was definitely in a severe minority situation. [But] … enough people came forward to help that the negative effects of racism were minimized for me.”

Any effects that did linger failed to keep Mahoney from her accomplishments. She “received a series of National Science Foundation fellowships, followed by teaching assistantships awarded by Ohio State.” She also worked hard to build close working relationships with the math department faculty. During the Warren interview, Mahoney gave a shout-out to those who were “always there for [her]”— including Dijen Ray-Chadhiuri, Tom Dowling, Joan and Tim Leitzel, Frank Demana, Bogden Baishanski, Joe Ferrer, and L. Allayne Parsons. But she also stated that “almost every professor she came in contact with at Ohio State provided some measure of mentoring or acted as a role model.” 

Dr. Mahoney completed her master’s degree in 1972, followed by her doctorate degree in 1983. Upon graduating, she became the 25th Black woman in the United States to earn a PhD in Mathematics.

After graduation, Dr. Mahoney made significant contributions to the math world—the most notable being her work with mathematician Kiran B. Chilakamarri. Together, Mahoney and Chilakamarri proved that some “graphs on the integer lattice produce a Ramsey type result”: something never-before seen in the field of graph theory.

And as she was making these breakthroughs in the mathematical world, Dr. Mahoney worked as a professor, program director, board member, provost and university president. She performed each leadership position with pride, acting as a “mirror” for Black women in mathematics. 

Dr. Mahoney used her leadership roles to initiate change within classrooms, schools, and even entire school districts. In 2003, she published a paper on rural communities that struggled to teach mathematics to their students. She outlined five solutions—teacher education (primary and secondary), mentoring, research, and partnership—to cover the disparity in rural mathematics education. She also fostered welcoming environments for women studying math. Dr. Mahoney served as the President at Project CEOS (Comprehensive Equity at Ohio State): an organization that supports women through their four-year STEM journey at OSU. She also increased enrollments among women at Lincoln University, where she later led as the university’s first female president.

Dr. Carolyn Mahoney has received many honors for her work in mathematics and math equity. California State University established a scholarship in her name, which rewards approximately $500 to a deserving math major. Lincoln University created a beautiful walking trail on their main campus, also in her name. For awards, Dr. Mahoney’s received the National Association of Mathematicians’ 2018 Lifetime Achievement Award and the Ralph S. Brown Award for Shared Governance. And—for her contributions to the “growth and progress of Ohio, the United States, and the world”—Dr. Carolyn Mahoney was inducted into the Ohio Women’s Hall of Fame in 1989.