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My dear Dr. Boatwright...

A warm greeting and a brave demand that a woman's work be compensated equitably at the University of Richmond continues to inspire as the world celebrates the value and contribution of women.

“My dear Dr. Boatwright” begins the May 31, 1920, letter from May Keller, the dean hired a few years earlier to head up Richmond College’s new undergraduate college for women, Westhampton College. While this salutation was customary for 1920, the letter’s content was not: a demand for a higher salary, a condemnation of institutional sexism, and a critique of University governance for its absence of women.

“It is certainly true that the main interest has been Richmond College since I have been here,” Keller writes, “and that everything on the entire campus has been arranged for the comfort and convenience of the boys.” I imagine Keller writing this letter to her boss, Frederic Boatwright, the Richmond College (soon renamed University of Richmond) president, with tight, controlled fury.

Alumnae describe “Miss Keller” as petite, under five feet, but fearsome in her commitment to the highest standards for Westhampton College. Specifically, Keller was responding to Boatwright’s May 28 letter offering her a subpar salary and a rebuke: “For some time,” he chides, “there has seemed to be on your part a lack of hearty cooperation and a tendency to make demands rather than to state needs.” Boatwright, understanding Keller’s influence among students, faculty, and alumnae, finally agreed to her demand for higher pay, although an admonishment accompanied the offer: “I shall be glad to have your early acceptance of this proposition, and with a full and friendly understanding that I shall have your cooperation in the conduct of the affairs of Westhampton College.”

Written at a time when authoritative research concluded that going to college would compromise a girl’s fertility and before women could vote across the nation, Keller’s letter reflects her convictions that women deserved respect as men’s equals and that they themselves must demand that respect. Salary negotiation, debate, leaning into their authority: these strategies are as important to Westhampton students today as they were in 1920. And the principles that Keller established for the college — including taking women seriously and self-advocacy for advancement — continue to undergird every aspect of my own work 100 years later.

Juliette Landphair is the vice president for student affairs at the University of Mary Washington. She holds a master’s degree and doctorate in history from the University of Virginia and a bachelor’s degree in history and French from Tulane University. Her essay about Dean Keller's letter to President Boatwright was originally published in the Autum 2014 issue of the magazine as part of a larger feature on ten objects that tell the history of Westhampton College.