Ella Lillian Wall Van Leer was an American artist and architect, women's rights activist, and the first woman to serve in an office of the American Legion in California. She was known as the "First Lady of Georgia Tech" and remained an advocate for women in engineering throughout her entire life.
Early life and education
Wall was born on November 21, 1892 in Berkeley. Her father, A. Conrad Wall, was a marine engineer. In 1910, Wall graduated from Berkeley High School, after which she enrolled at UC Berkeley. While there, she was a member of the Alpha Xi Delta sorority; years later, she would be instrumental in creating the Tau Sigma society at Georgia Tech, which will eventually be absorbed in the Alpha Xi Delta. In 1915, after defending her thesis "The Functions of Rhythm Motives in Decorative Design," Wall received an M.A. in Art and Architecture, subjects she later taught at several high schools in California. In July 1918, a year after the United States entered the First World War, Wall enlisted in the Army Nursing Corps at the Letterman Army Hospital on the Presidio of San Francisco. She was tasked with various therapies, medical illustration and leading facial paralysis cases, before being mobilized for overseas duty four months later. She returned to the United States in March 1920, and after serving in the U.S.A. General Hospital 3 in Colonia, New Jersey, she went back to California to teach. In 1923, she became the first woman to serve in an office of the American Legion in California, as second vice commander of the Berkeley Post No. 7.
In 1924, Ella Lillian Wall married Blake Ragsdale Van Leer and added his surname to her own; from then on, she often dropped the "Lillian" from her lengthy name, typically going by Ella Wall Van Leer. During her marriage, Wall pursued her career as an artist, working as an illustrator for Rand McNally, and, during the Second World War, Ella worked at the office of the Quartermaster General as a principal draftsman and technologist of the research and development branch in Washington. She also designed the president's home on campus. After her husband became president of Georgia Institute of Technology in 1944, Wall became the "backbone of women" at the school and their "unofficial dean", campaigning for women's rights and successfully petitioning for an overturn of the statute barring female students from enrolling. After Blake Van Leer died in 1956, Ella bought a house in the vicinity of Georgia Tech and turned it into "an unofficial women's dormitory". She was also active in the Georgia Tech chapter of the Society of Women Engineers, while serving as the trustee, President of the Auxiliary and Director of Volunteers at the Egleston Hospital from 1959 until her retirement in 1976. Wall died on August 8, 1986, at the age of 93, in Alexandria, Virginia. She was buried at the Marietta National Cemetery in Cobb County, Georgia.
