William Wells Brown (November 6, 1814 – November 6, 1884) was an American abolitionist, novelist, playwright, and historian. Born into slavery near Mount Sterling, Kentucky, Brown escaped to Ohio in 1834 at the age of 19. He settled in Boston, Massachusetts, where he worked for abolitionist causes and became a prolific writer. While working for abolition, Brown also supported causes including: temperance, women's suffrage, pacifism, prison reform, and an anti-tobacco movement. His novel Clotel (1853), considered the first novel written by an African American, was published in London, England, where he resided at the time. It was later published in the United States.
William Whewell was an English polymath, scientist, Anglican priest, philosopher, theologian, and historian of science. He was Master at Trinity College, Cambridge. In his time as a student there, he achieved distinction in both poetry and mathematics.
William Wordsworth was an English Romantic poet who, with Samuel Taylor Coleridge, helped to launch the Romantic Age in English literature with their joint publication Lyrical Ballads (1798).
Willis Fletcher Johnson, was an author, journalist, and lecturer who had a twenty-year tenure as the foreign and diplomatic editorial writer for The New York Tribune.
Willis George Emerson (1856–1918) was an American novelist, Chicago newspaperman, lawyer, politician, and promoter, who formed the North American Copper Company in Wyoming. He founded the town of Encampment, Wyoming.
