WILLARD, EMMA (1787-1876), American educator, born at Berlin, Conn., Feb. 23, 1787. She began teaching at 16 years of age. In 1807 she became principal of a girls' academy at Mid dlebury, Vt., and in 1814 she opened a boarding school of her own. Her Plan for Improving Female Education (1819), first addressed to the New York State Legislature, found favour with Governor Clinton who invited her to move her school to Water ford, N.Y. Two years later (1821) it was moved to Troy as the Troy Female Seminary. In 1830 she travelled abroad for her health and aided in founding a girls' school in Athens, Greece. The proceeds from her Journal and Letters from France and Great Britain (1833) were given to this school. After 1838 she spent most of her time lecturing and revising her text-books. In 47 she travelled 8,000 miles throughout the south and west um.
ing and counseling in educational matters. In 1854, with Henry Barnard, she represented the United States at the World's Educa tional Convention in London. Her Ancient Geography (2nd. ed., 1827); History of the United States (1828); Astronomy (1853); and Morals for the Young (1857) passed through many editions and were widely used as text-books up to the time of her death. She published also a volume of poems, of which the best known is "Rocked in the Cradle of the Deep." Her death occurred at Troy, N.Y., on April 15, 1876. See A. Lutz, Emma Willard (1929). WILLARD, FRANCES ELIZABETH American reformer, was born at Churchville, Monroe county (N.Y.), on Sept. 28, 1839. In 1859 she graduated at the North
western Female college at Evanston (Ill.). She then became a teacher, and in 1871-74 she was president and professor of aesthet ics of the Woman's college at Evanston, which became part of the Northwestern university in 1873. In 1874 she became corre sponding secretary and from 1879 until her death was president of the National Woman's Christian Temperance Union, and from 1883 until her death was president of the World's Woman's Christian Temperance Union. In 1890 she was elected president of the Woman's National Council, which represented nearly all of the women's societies in America. She was one of the founders of Our Union, a New York publication in the interests of the Na tional Woman's Christian Temperance Union. She died in New York city on Feb. 18, 1898.
With Mary A. Livermore she edited A Woman of the Century (Buffalo [N.Y.], 1893) , which includes a sketch of her life ; and she pub. Nineteen Beautiful Years (1864), a life of her sister; How to Win: A Book for Girls (i886) ; Glimpses of Fifty Years (1889) ; and, in collab. with H. M. Winslow, Mrs. S. J. White and others, Occupa tions for Women (1897). See A. A. Gordon, The Beautiful Life of Frances E. Willard (Chicago, 1898) , with an intro. by Lady Henry Somerset, and W. M. Thayer, Women Who Win (1896).