Julia Gregg Brill was the first female professor in Penn State’s English Department where she taught composition from 1924 to 1954. She was a tireless advocate for women, and the university recognized her for her work.
Born in Tyrone, in 1891, Brill earned her teaching certificate from Bloomsburg Normal School. She started her teaching career in Luzerne Countyin a one-room schoolhouse in Town Hill before teaching high school at Huntington Mills. She then enrolled at Penn State in 1918 and graduated three years later with a degree in classical languages.
Brill began working for Penn State in 1924 before completing her master’s degree in English in 1927. She was the only female English professor until World War II, which she described as a “bonanza for women… they had to hire them because there were no men.”
Outside the classroom, Brill also served as a vocational counselor. She focused on helping female students find job opportunities. In 1932, she published a 50-page manual entitled Occupational Opportunities for Women in the School of Liberal Arts of The Pennsylvania State College. The handbook included information on more than 40 careers, including banking, nursing, law, secretarial work, education, journalism, and advertising. In 1937, she published a supplement to the manual and compiled A Bibliography of Vocational Literature.
Beyond teaching and counseling, Brill devoted herself to the college and the community in other ways. She compiled histories and reports on various subjects, including a biography of the first female graduate of Penn State, Rebecca Hannah Ewing. She also founded Purple Quill, a student and faculty literary society.
Brill wrote numerous articles about women at Penn State. Her 1927 piece “The Girls of Penn State” examined the history of female enrollment and the rise of dorms, clubs, and athletics for women.
Starting in 1925, she wrote a regular column in the Penn State Alumni News, later The Penn Stater, which eventually became “Here and There with the Girls,” with news of Penn State’s women for a magazine that rarely mentioned women. In 1930 the Alumni Association reorganized to function more effectively. As a result, the Association made Brill its first female officer and a director. She continued to serve on the Alumni Association’s Council and Executive Board and the Alumni Fund Council’s board, later the Penn State Foundation, into her retirement.
Brill retired from Penn State in 1954 as a professor emerita of English, after which she continued to be an active community member. She volunteered at Schlow Library for 20 years.
In 1958, Brill was named the first “Woman of the Year” by the Board of Trustees. Several years later, the “Woman of the Year” award was folded into the Distinguished Alumni awards. Today, the awards now include both men and women. In 1977, she became the first woman to receive the Lion’s Paw Society’s medal, awarded for service to the University and “fostering worthwhile traditions or enhancing student life.”
Brill died in Mechanicsburg in 1985 at the age of 93. Brill Hall and the Brill Professor of Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at Penn State are named for her.
Juliana Hart
Sources:
A Bibliography of Vocational Literature, Julia Gregg Brill papers, Eberly Family Special Collections Library, Pennsylvania State University.
Correspondence to Major R.M. Spengler, Julia Gregg Brill papers, Eberly Family Special Collections Library, Pennsylvania State University.
Julia Gregg Brill and Ruth A. Martin. “The Girls of Penn State,” The Penn State Alumni News, April 1927.
Julia Gregg Brill papers. https://aspace.libraries.psu.edu/repositories/3/resources/1342. (Accessed January 25, 2024).
Occupational Opportunities for Women in the School of Liberal Arts of The Pennsylvania State College, Julia Gregg Brill papers, Eberly Family Special Collections Library, Pennsylvania State University.
First Published: March 31, 2024
Last Modified: April 5, 2024