ABSTRACT
Charles Sanders Peirce (1839-1914), one of America's greatest philosophers, mathematicians, and logicians, was a difficult and not altogether pleasant character. That, combined with what the establishment regarded as moral lapses, resulted in the fact that he was thwarted in his attempts to obtain a permanent academic post and died a malnourished and impoverished outcast. He was dismissed from his brief stint at Johns Hopkins University, dismissed from his service with the US Coast Survey (a job handed to him by his father, its superintendent), and ostracized by his alma mater - Harvard University.
