Henry Ernest Dudeney/Puzzles and Curious Problems/177 - Square of Squares/Historical Note
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Historical Note on Puzzles and Curious Problems by Henry Ernest Dudeney: $177$ - Square of Squares
This puzzle also appears in Dudeney's $1917$ collection Amusements in Mathematics, under the title $173$ - Mrs. Perkins's Quilt.
The problem had previously appeared in $1907$ in the first issue of Our Puzzle Magazine, edited by Sam Loyd.
This was later published in Loyd's pusthumous collection Cyclopedia of Puzzles.
If Loyd stole it from Dudeney, then Dudeney must have published it somewhere before $1907$.
Martin Gardner reports in $1968$ that the general problem of dividing a square lattice of any size along lattice lines into the smallest number of squares has been discussed but not solved in several places, including by him.
The corresponding problem on a triangular lattice, he reports, had not been studied at that time.
Sources
- 1964: J.H. Conway: Mrs. Perkins's Quilt (Proc. Camb. Phil. Soc. Vol. 60: pp. 363 – 368)
- 1965: G.B. Trustrum: Mrs. Perkins's Quilt (Proc. Camb. Phil. Soc. Vol. 61: pp. 7 – 11)
- September 1966: Martin Gardner: Mathematical Games (Scientific American )
- 1968: Henry Ernest Dudeney: 536 Puzzles & Curious Problems ... (previous) ... (next): Answers: $343$. Square of Squares
- 1975: Martin Gardner: Mathematical Carnival: $11$: Mrs. Perkins' Quilt and Other Square-Packing Problems