Laubacher with his goddaughter, Mara. Courtesy | Jacob Laubacher

In this Quick Hits, Associate Professor of Mathematics Jacob Laubacher talks math, beauty, and knitting.

When did you first get the nickname “Dr. L”?

It was probably my first year being a professor [at St. Norbert College]. This would have been nine years ago. I found students had a hard time pronouncing my last name and spelling it. I’ve gotten some very weird [versions] like “Dr. Log Chopper,” “Dr. Lamberger,” and “Dr. Lawbreaker.” So I just decided, let’s go with L, and that seemed to work. It’s hard to misspell. 

What do most people misunderstand about math? 

Because of how we were trained young, a lot of people just see it as, “I’m just trying to solve for x.” I think it’s unfortunate that you have to go through so much math to see the other very large, often hidden, beautiful side of math. It’s all beautiful to me, but the side of logic and proofs and writing and all these things that I’ve now built a career on is not what people think about when they think “math.”

Why did you choose to go into math? 

The wand chooses the wizard. I didn’t choose this. Math chose me, I guess. My parents always tried to tell me and my siblings to do what you love. I always liked math, though, so I blindly kept pursuing math because it made sense.

What would you be doing if you’d never fallen in love with math? 

I would have taken over the family furniture business. We were Labaucher Upholstery. We would refinish furniture. My grandpa started it in 1949, and then my dad took it over, and then I worked for him for summers growing up. He trained me to do all that stuff.

What is your favorite childhood memory?

Probably cutting and hauling firewood for my grandpa to make maple syrup. We would make maple syrup together. That was 40 gallons of sap to make one gallon of syrup. It’s quite the process.

How did you end up at Hillsdale?

Hillsdale is a pretty magical place. It’s been on my radar ever since I was maybe a junior at Ohio Dominican University, and I was complaining about something, and my dad was like, “Why don’t you just go to Hillsdale?” And I told him, “Why didn’t you tell me about Hillsdale?” I didn’t even know about it! So then I went and got a job, and getting a job as a professor in math is hard, just like a lot of other subjects. I think I applied to 102 schools, and I had five interviews and one job offer. So I went to Wisconsin; that’s where the offer was. I got lucky enough last year: Hillsdale happened to be hiring, so I was like, “Wow, how about that? Is that luck or God was looking out for me?”

What’s a quirky hobby no one expects you have?

I taught myself how to knit. I got injured from running in grad school, and running was my escape. When I couldn’t run for a few months, I thought I might end up in an asylum. So I needed some outlet to do something while I’m sitting on the couch. At first, I was just shuffling a deck of cards, and I thought, “That’s no good.” So I decided I can pick up a hobby where I actually get something out of it. I was at Bowling Green at the time, and they had a small local shop, and the ladies there got me all set up: some knitting needles, some yarn, a book, and then I would go back to them every week with what I was doing, and they would just rip me to shreds, tell me all the things I was doing wrong, and try to help me fix it. Now that’s something I’ve continued to this day.

What’s the most interesting thing you ever knitted?

Probably Christmas stockings. It took me a while to get the right proportions and figure out how to turn the toe or the heel, but now I kind of got it down, and everyone gets a stocking.

Which is better, a whiteboard or a chalkboard?

Chalkboard! We’ll start with erasing. Erasing a whiteboard — it’s awful. Kill me, shoot me, gut me — in that order. It’s not good. Also, when you’re teaching for 50 minutes, a whiteboard marker will not hold up. A lot of the people who say they like whiteboards, it’s because they’re in bio or something, and they write on the board on a whiteboard for two minutes of those 50. Try writing for 50 minutes straight — that marker won’t last! And the marker smells; I’ll get a headache. That’s no good. If we didn’t have chalkboards here, I wouldn’t be at Hillsdale.

You have a Rubik’s cube on your shelf. When did you first learn to solve it? 

I think I was a high school senior.

How fast can you solve it now?

In my peak, we used to do tournaments in grad school, almost like a March Madness in brackets — a best of best of three and then elimination. I think my best is 32 seconds. I don’t think I could do that now. … At Kent State, where I got my master’s, one of my professors was on the team of researchers who killed the cube. No matter how you scramble the cube, you can do it in 20 moves or less. He was on that team. I took a cube theory course in grad school, which is a lot of group theory. It was so cool.