Felix Christian Klein (1849 - 1925) was a German mathematician known for his work in geometry, group theory, function theory and non-euclidian geometry.
His 1872 Erlangen program? classifies geometries according to their group of symmetries. He accepted a chair at the University of Göttingen? in 1886. From then until his 1913 retirement, he sought to re-establish Göttingen as the world’s leading mathematics research center. He taught a variety of courses, mainly on the interface between mathematics and physics, such as mechanics and potential theory. In 1895, he hired David Hilbert? away from Königsberg; this appointment proved fateful, because Hilbert continued Göttingen’s glory until his own retirement in 1932.