New York English teacher Alice Duer Miller was also an accomplished mathematician and prolific writer. Photo Credit: Kappa Kappa Gamma
Often teachers can be counted upon to throw themselves into causes that benefit humanity as a whole. This is true of Alice Duer Miller, an English teacher who became a tireless suffragist.
Alice Duer was born on Staten Island, New York, on July 28, 1874. As a young girl, she enjoyed a privileged upbringing, but the fortunes of her family took a down-turn at about the time she entered college. Even though she was on a limited budget, she was able to study at Barnard College, the women’s institution of higher learning associated with Columbia University. Barnard, founded in 1889, is known as one of the Seven Sister Colleges. Alice earned her degree in 1899, and later she completed graduate courses in mathematics at Columbia. She also studied astronomy and navigation, even becoming the navigator on a friend’s yacht during one summer vacation.
In 1899, Alice married Henry Wise Miller, and the couple emigrated to Costa Rica, where they attempted to establish a rubber farm. Alas, the venture was unsuccessful, and so they returned to the United States. Alice accepted a position as an English Composition teacher at a girls school, while Henry worked at the Stock Exchange. She taught there for several years, tutoring prospective college students in mathematics on the side.
Alice’s hard work was not confined to the classroom. Alice became an ardent suffragist. She penned columns in support of the cause. She also served on the Barnard Board of Trustees from 1922 to 1942. She even co-authored a history of the school entitled Barnard College: The First Fifty Years, which was published in 1939.
Throughout her career as an educator, Alice became a prolific writer and editor. She wrote short stories, poetry, screenplays, and novels. She published a novel called Come Out of the Kitchen in 1916, and her fiction was frequently adapted to stage and film. She also continued to publish columns, including Are Women People? and Women are People! Her verse novel, The White Cliffs, was adapted into a film. She even dabbled in acting when she appeared in a film production of Soak the Rich. Some of her pieces were published in The Saturday Evening Post, The Ladies Home Journal, and Harper’s Bazaar, and she was listed as an Advisory Editor in the very first issue of The New Yorker Magazine.
As a suffragist, Alice contributed to the cause by writing a column published in the New York Tribune where she released pro-suffrage satirical poems. Later the poems were complied into a book entitled Are Women People? A Book of Rhymes for Suffrage Times (1915). She also became an active member of the Congressional Union for Women Suffrage (CUWS).
During her lifetime, Alice earned many honors. She was made a Curtiss Scholar in Pure Science in her senior year of college, and was inducted into Kappa Kappa Gamma while a student at Barnard, and she became a member of Phi Beta Kappa in 1926. Columbia University gave her a University Medal in 1933, and conferred an honorary doctorate in 1942.
Sadly, Alice Duer Miller passed away on August 22, 1942, following a lengthy illness. She is buried at Evergreen Cemetery in Morristown, New Jersey.
