Emily Penrose

Dame Emily Penrose, (18 September 1858 – 26 January 1942) was British academic. She was an ancient historian and principal of three early women's university colleges in the United Kingdom: Bedford College from 1893 until 1898, Royal Holloway College from 1898 until 1907, and Somerville College, Oxford University from 1907 until 1926. She was the first woman to achieve First Class honours in Classics at Oxford University, and was instrumental in securing the admission of women as full members of the university in 1920. She became Oxford's first Dame in 1927.

Family and early life Emily Penrose was born in London in 1858. She was the second of five siblings, and oldest daughter of Francis Cramer Penrose and his wife Harriette Gibbes, the daughter of Francis Gibbes, a surgeon of Harewood in West Yorkshire. Her paternal grandmother was the author Elizabeth Penrose, who published under the name Mrs Markham.

Private education Penrose studied in a private school in Wimbledon before studying languages in Versailles, Paris, Dresden and Berlin.

Life in Athens She lived with her family in Athens during 1886–87 while her father was director of the British School, during which time she kept a diary detailing her life in Athens and travels around Greece, and learned modern Greek. She chose to specialise in archaeology after her experiences in Athens, and in 1892 became the first woman to achieve First Class honours in Greats (Classics).

Career Upon completing her undergraduate studies, Penrose was offered a post by Agnes Maitland, the principal of Somerville, designed to keep her at the college as a combined tutor, librarian and secretary, but instead moved to London. She taught for a short time as an extension lecturer in Oxford and London before being appointed as Principal of Bedford College in 1893. She was given the additional post of Professor of Ancient History in 1894, "without additional stipend". According to Margaret Tuke's history of the college, "It is a tribute to her character and statesmanship that, in spite of the limited sphere accorded to her by the authorities, she should have accomplished so much in so few years." During Penrose's time as principal, the students' social life developed as their numbers increased, Penrose had also introduced an entrance examination for students seeking to join Somerville in 1908, making it the first women's college to do so. She was responsible for adding additional tutors, including Helen Darbishire and Margaret Hayes Robinson to the Somerville staff, and enabled tutors to become part of Somerville's council for the first time in 1921. and a member of the Royal Commission on the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge in 1919.

Legacy

The success of the 1920 campaign to admit women as full members of the University of Oxford owed much to the diplomatic skills and academic reputation of Penrose. Somerville's Penrose building, opened in 1934, is named after her.

A 1946 obituary of Penrose concluded on her qualities, "For all her masculine powers and feminine accomplishments, her great qualities were neither masculine nor feminine, but simply those that belong to great persons." and portraits, including by Francis William Helps, Philip de László, and the Rhomaides Brothers.