Blanche Wheeler Williams

Emile Blanche Wheeler (also Emile Blanche Wheeler Williams, born January 9, 1870 in Concord, Massachusetts, † December 9, 1936 in Cambridge, Massachusetts) was an American archaeologist. She assisted Harriet Ann Boyd, the first woman to lead archaeological excavations in the discovery of Gournia.

Life

Emile Blanche Wheeler was the daughter of George Francis Wheeler and Alice Rattray. The Wheeler family is long established in Massachusetts and goes back to the first Pilgrims of the Plymouth Colony. As a child she had close contact with her ​​grandmother Harriet Lincoln Wheeler, who was a devotee of transcendentalism and with the thought leaders Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Amos Bronson Alcott, Louisa May Alcott and Abigail May Alcott close friends.

Blanche Wheeler studied at Smith College in Northampton Classical Studies. Here she met Harriet Ann Boyd, who became a good friend. Although she was a good student, she broke off his studies with a Bachelor, which was not unusual for a woman at that time.

From 1892 to 1904 she worked at the High School Mary C. Wheeler School her aunt Mary Colman Wheeler and taught Latin, Greek and English. From 1898 to 1899 Blanche Wheeler put a sabbatical year so, to study at the American School of Classical Studies in Rome. Along with Harriet Ann Boyd and Mary K. Waring, she traveled to Greece and visited Aegina, Phocis, Phthiotis, the Peloponnese and Attica.

1901 was Jane Boit Patten, who had a year earlier support Harriet Ann Boyd in their excavations on the island of Crete, indispensable and so Blanche Wheeler stood in for her. On May 7, 1901 began with excavations in Avgo Valley and then at the place Aloni at Kavousi, but the finds were meager. Therefore Harriet Boyd was looking for a better archaeological site from the Bronze Age. By the tip from a local farmers people became aware of Gournia. After test excavations turned out that the place of rich pickings promised. After they had received the excavation permit, a Bronze Age city appeared.

At the next excavation in Gournia 1903 Blanche Wheeler was unable to attend and Richard Berry Seager so took their place. However, they participated in the publication of excavation results. In 1904 she married Emile Francis Williams, a Oriental rug importer, with whom she later co-wrote a book Undiscovered France. A recent book Mary C. Wheeler. Leader in Art and Education. wrote Blanche Wheeler -Williams in honor of her aunt.

Works

• Stone Vases in Gournia, Vasiliki and other prehistoric cities on the Isthmus of Ierapetra, Crete; excavations of the Wells- Houston - Cramp expeditions in 1901, 1903, 1904, the American Society exploration, Free Museum of Science and Art, 1908
• Cult Objects in Gournia, Vasiliki and other prehistoric cities on the Isthmus of Ierapetra, Crete; excavations of the Wells- Houston - Cramp expeditions in 1901, 1903, 1904, the American Society exploration, Free Museum of Science and Art, 1908
• Religion of the Minoans in Gournia, Vasiliki and other prehistoric cities on the Isthmus of Ierapetra, Crete; excavations of the Wells- Houston - Cramp expeditions in 1901, 1903, 1904, the American Society exploration, Free Museum of Science and Art, 1908
• Stones from Hawes Gournia, Vasiliki and other prehistoric cities on the Isthmus of Ierapetra, Crete; excavations of the Wells- Houston - Cramp expeditions in 1901, 1903, 1904, the American Society exploration, Free Museum of Science and Art, 1908
• Minoan Writing and Dress in Gournia, Vasiliki and other prehistoric cities on the Isthmus of Ierapetra, Crete; excavations of the Wells- Houston - Cramp expeditions in 1901, 1903, 1904, the American Society exploration, Free Museum of Science and Art, 1908
• Together with Emile Francis Williams. Undiscovered France; to eight -weeks automobile trip in the provinces with special reference to the architecture, archeology, history, and scenery. Boston, Houghton Mifflin, 1927.
• Mary C. Wheeler. Leader in Art and Education. Providence, Wheeler School.