The Remarkable Life and Career of Ellen Swallow Richards: Pioneer in Science and Technology

Chapter 4

Setting Sights

“Farewell to Littleton; met Father at Waldo House and took the Albany express at 10:00.”

~ Ellen Swallow, September 15, 1868

Ellen searched and searched to find a college in New England that would accept females for the study of science; there were none yet. But then, while reading Godey’s Lady’s Book, she spotted information about a college for women called Vassar that had just opened in Poughkeepsie, New York, and offered science! Ecstatic, she read that Vassar was not a ladies’ finishing school, where privileged young women “finished” their education and prepared to become suitable wives by learning proper etiquette and cultural values, and by being instructed in the arts. Nor was Vassar a glorified girls’ academy. It was a true college that would teach the same subjects on the same level as the men’s colleges.

Vassar’s founders, who included Sarah Josepha Hale of Godey’s Lady’s Book, envisioned it as “a college for young women, which shall be to them what Yale and Harvard are to young men.” (Remarkably, according to Vassar records, more science was offered at Vassar than at either of those prestigious men’s colleges.) The college hired leading scholars of the day to instruct. Vassar was exactly what Ellen had been looking for, and she made up her mind to do whatever it took to get there.

Some people, conflicted about higher education for young ladies, called Vassar College “Matthew Vassar’s Great Experiment.” This did not deter Ellen. She loved that ...