Academics: Library & Archive
Emma (Hart) Willard Collection, 1809–1994
Volume:
4.5 Cubic feet (10 boxes)
Processed by Sheryl Drexelius
May 1991 (Revised July 2001)
Conservation:
Photographs were encapsulated in polypropylene sleeves. Newspaper clippings were photocopied onto acid free paper. All material was removed to acid free boxes and placed in acid free folders.
Restrictions:
Open to all researchers. Please make an appointment with the School Librarian to request permission to use the collection.
Copyright:
Request permission to publish original materials from the Emma Willard School Librarian, Dietel Library, Emma Willard School, 285 Pawling Avenue, Troy, New York 12180.
History and Provenance Note
This collection brought together by the staff of the Emma Willard School, contains not only the unpublished and published writings of Emma (Hart) Willard, but also published and unpublished information written about her. Specific forms of material in the collection include letters, diaries, autograph albums, account books, photographs, engravings, silhouettes, unpublished manuscripts and published books, articles, and poems. The papers are arranged so that material created and received by Emma (Hart) Willard in the course of her lifetime is maintained together, and information about her, both during her lifetime and after her death, is maintained together. Arrangement within each series is chronological with the undated materials being placed at the end.Biographical Note
Emma Hart was born the ninth child of Captain Samuel Hart and his second wife Lydia Hinsdale, and was the 16th of Captain Hart's 17 children. In the spring of 1807 she became an assistant at the Academy in Westfield, Massachusetts, and that summer she was named preceptress of the Academy in Middlebury, Vermont. She gave up teaching when she became the third wife of Dr. John Willard, one of Middlebury’s leading citizens. In 1810, Emma and John Willard’s only child, John Hart Willard was born.As a result of financial losses suffered by her husband, Emma Willard decided to open the Middlebury Female Seminary in her home. In 1818, she sent Governor DeWitt Clinton of New York a manuscript of her "Plan for Improving Female Education." Although the New York State Legislature rejected her proposal to endow a female seminary in New York, the Willards moved to Waterford, N.Y., and opened a female seminary at the urging of the town’s citizens. In 1821, Mrs. Willard moved her school to Troy, N.Y., where the city’s Common Council had raised $4,000 for the purchase of a school building. Willard’s husband, John, died in 1825, leaving her with the responsibility of raising their son and operating the Troy Female Seminary alone.
While running her school, Emma Willard continued to further her education and to publish numerous books, articles, and poems. The school was very successful, and in 1838, Willard turned its management over to her son, John Hart Willard and his wife Sarah. She married Dr. Christopher Yates in 1838, but was granted a divorce from him in 1843. Mrs. Willard returned to the Troy Female Seminary in 1844, where she continued to work as an advocate for the advancement of women’s education and peace, which she became interested in as a result of the Civil War. Emma Hart Willard died on April 15, 1870 in Troy, N. Y.
