WHEELER, Dame OLIVE ANNIE (1886 - 1963), psychologist and educationist

Olive Wheeler was born in Brecon on 4 May 1886, the younger daughter of Annie Wheeler (née Poole) and her husband, Henry Burford Wheeler, a printer and publisher. She received her early education at Brecon County School for Girls, before enrolling at the University College of Wales, Aberystwyth, in 1904, where she graduated with a BSc in Chemistry in 1907, a University of Wales Teaching Certificate in 1908, and an MSc in 1911. She completed a DSc in psychology at Bedford College, London, in 1916 and studied briefly at the University of Paris.

Wheeler taught at Chesterfield High School, before lecturing at St George's Training College, Edinburgh and in mental and moral science at Cheltenham Ladies' College. In 1918 she was appointed Lecturer in Education at the University of Manchester, serving as Dean of Education between 1923 and 1925. In 1925, Wheeler became the third woman to hold the chair Professor of Education (Women) at the University College of South Wales and Monmouthshire (UCSWM) in Cardiff. When the training departments for men and women teachers merged in 1932, the Department for Education at Cardiff came under her headship. She also served as the Dean of the Faculty of Education between 1948 and 1951. From her retirement in 1951, she was professor emeritus of the University of Wales.

Throughout her adult life, Wheeler was actively involved in the intellectual, administrative and social life of the University of Wales. During her time as a student at Aberystwyth she served as president of the Women's Sectional Council (1907-08) and president of the Students' Representative Council. She gained attention for her leading role in what became known as the Alexandra Hall Revolt of 1907, when a group of women students submitted a list of complaints to the Senate about the food and service in the Hall and the conduct of the Warden. This led to an external inquiry and the resignation of the Warden the following year. Following her graduation, Wheeler acted as president and vice-president of the Aberystwyth Old Students' Association, and sat on the university's Court of Governors. She later served on the Welsh Joint Education Committee, and the Council of the Welsh National School of Medicine.

Wheeler was a pioneer of interdisciplinary research, applying psychology to issues of educational policy and practice. She highlighted the importance of early childhood in psychological development, and advocated training in child psychology for parents and teachers. During her tenure as Dean of the Faculty of Education she developed closer links between the teacher training colleges and universities, establishing the Cardiff and District Educational Society and a collegiate centre on Cathedral Road, Cardiff, where local teachers could develop skills for research in schools. Her research also focused on the educational effects of bilingualism in Welsh schools, and on the psychological impact of unemployment. She spoke at mental health conferences and argued that sex segregation in education was detrimental to the development of emotional health. In conjunction with her research interests, Wheeler was also a promoter of the nursery school movement: she served as chair of the Cardiff and District Nursery School Association, and later presided over the Welsh committee in a fundraising campaign for a memorial to Margaret McMillan (1860-1931), the pioneer of nursery schools.

Wheeler was a strong advocate of women's rights. In 1922, she stood as a parliamentary candidate for the University of Wales seat as one of 33 women candidates in that year's general election. Following in the footsteps of her academic predecessor at the UCSWM, Professor Millicent Mackenzie (1863-1942), Wheeler also stood unsuccessfully as a Labour candidate. Despite her defeat, Wheeler nearly doubled the Labour vote in the University of Wales, polling 309 votes against the victorious Liberal candidate, Thomas Arthur Lewis's 497 votes. Wheeler played a leading role in women's associational culture in Cardiff: she was an active member of the city's branches of the British Federation of University Women (vice-president) and the Women Citizens' Association. She was extensively connected to headmistresses of local girls' schools and regularly spoke at prize-giving ceremonies. Wheeler was also a member of the Welsh Branch of the Association of Science Teachers, an Executive Member of the South Wales Association of Girls' Clubs, and a regional adviser to the South Wales Women's Voluntary Service.

Wheeler's academic and social networks were impressive, and she regularly delivered public lectures and addressed local associations across south Wales. She served on the Central Advisory Council for Education (Wales), was elected chair of the Welsh Advisory Committee for Youth Unemployment in 1947 and was chair of the South Wales District of the Workers' Educational Association. She was also a Welsh representative on the General Advisory Council of the BBC, and a Fellow of the British Psychological Society.

She worked tirelessly throughout her life to promote causes particularly relating to education, children and women. Her services to education in Wales were formally recognised when she was made a DBE in 1949. In her retirement, she undertook a lecture tour of Canada and was a British Delegate to the International Congress of Psychology in Montreal in 1954.

Olive Wheeler died in the Kardomah Café in Cardiff on 26 September 1963. She bequeathed her books and £500 for an annual student education prize to the University College, Cardiff, and a further £250 each to the South Wales District of the Workers' Educational Association and Park End Presbyterian Church, Cardiff.

Author

• Beth R. Jenkins

Sources

• Aberystwyth University Institutional Archive: Student Register, 1904-11; Letter from Olive A. Wheeler to the Senate, 2 December 1907, 3014; Alexandra Hall, Special Enquiry, November 1907, Box 5, 3803-3824
• Glamorgan Archives: Cardiff Women Citizens' Association Minute Book, DX675/1
• The Lady's Who's Who: who's who for British women, 1938-39 (London 1939)
• The Times, 17 November and 20 November 1922; 15 November 1963
• John B. Thomas, 'Wheeler, Dame Olive Annie (1886-1963)', Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, 2004
• Western Mail, 25 July 1927; 20 January 1934; 6 May 1935; 3 July 1935; 16 January 1939; 19 May 1947; 28 September 1963
• The Welsh Outlook, March 1922

Selected Publications

• Anthropomorphism and Science: A Study of the Development of Ejective Cognition in the Individual and the Race (London 1916)
• Bergson and Education (Manchester 1922)
• Youth: The Psychology of Adolescence and its Bearing on the Reorganisation of Adolescent Education (London 1929)
• Creative Education and the Future (London 1936)
• The Psychological Basis of Adult Education (1938)
• with Irene G. Earl, Nursery School Education and the Reorganization of the Infant School (London 1939)
• 'The Service of Youth', British Journal of Educational Psychology, 13, 2 (1943), pp.69-73
• The Adventure of Youth (Kent 1945)
• Ludwig Beethoven and the Chiming Tower Bells (1951)
• with Williams Phillips and Joseph P. Spillane, Mental Health and Education (London 1961)

Further reading

• Wikipedia Article: Olive Wheeler

Additional Links

• VIAF: 53685602
• Wikidata: Q7087219

Published date: 2021-05-05

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