Math Name Scramble

When you scramble the letters of “Math Name Scramble,” several excellent anagram-cum-headlines are formed. The results are just too spectacular not to have a little fun.

Lambs Cheat Merman
Schenectady, New York – Maybe she’s got rhythm, but Ethel Merman appears to be lacking in street smarts. When three young, corrupt sheep tempted her with a game of three-card monte, she should have politely declined. But she was insistent that identifying the proper card “shouldn’t be that difficult.” Fourteen failed attempts and $650 later, she finally accepted defeat. The ovine dealer, amused by Ms. Merman’s persistence, continually told her, “I get a kick out of you.”

Math, Camels, Barmen
Riyadh, Saudi Arabia – A mathematician and a camel walk into a bar. The barman says, “What is this, some kind of joke?”

Okay, enough of that silliness.

Lots of math words have interesting anagrams:

• scalene = cleanse
• thousand = handouts
• vector = covert
• algorithm = logarithm
• decimal point = I’m a pencil dot
• integral calculus = calculating rules
• innumerable = a number line

If you like anagrams, the following puzzle might be right up your alley.

The last names of ten famous mathematicians — all sufficiently scrambled, of course — are listed below.

• ACORN PIE
• A PASTRY HOG
• ASS REWRITES
• NO NUN MAVEN
• ON THREE
• RAIN MEN
• REAL GANG
• RED CHAMISE
• SCAREDEST
• THICK NERD EGO

Your task is to unscramble the names, then place them in the rows of the grid below. If you place the correct names in the correct order, another famous mathematician’s name will appear in the highlighted column.

Stumped? Don’t sweat it; lesser men have had to look at the solution, too.