Willard, Emma Hart (1787-1870), was an early American supporter of higher education for women. Her efforts advanced that movement in the United States. She also wrote a volume of poems that included “Rocked in the Cradle of the Deep” (1830).
Willard was born on Feb. 23, 1787, in Berlin, Connecticut, and started teaching school there at the age of 16. In 1809, she married John Willard, who helped her establish a girls’ boarding school at Middlebury, Vermont, in 1814. In 1819, she founded a girls’ seminary at Waterford, New York. It was moved to Troy, New York, in 1821. The school, the Troy Female Seminary, later became famous as the Emma Willard School. Willard strongly supported the establishment of public schools, and she educated hundreds of teachers in her schools for girls. She died on April 15, 1870.
