Emma C. (Hart) Willard (1787-1870) was an American women's rights advocate and the pioneer who founded the first women's school of higher education. She attended a district school at Worthington Point. Emma started teaching at the age of 17 and shortly after turning 20, received job offers from Westfield, Massachusetts, Middlebury, Vermont, and Hudson, New York. In 1814, she opened the Middlebury Female Seminary in her home. After moving to New York she opened the Waterford Academy in 1819 in Waterford, New York, but it was closed in 1821 due to a lack of continued funding by its citizens and administration. In 1830, she made a tour of Europe, and three years later published Journals and Letters From Great Britain. Her works include: The Woodbridge and Willard Geographies and Atlases (1823), History of the United States (1828), Universal History in Perspective (1837), Treatise on the Circulation of the Blood (1846) and Last Leaves of American History (1849).