In 1933 at its 110th Commencement, Martha Dickinson Bianchi (1866-1943) became the first woman to receive an honorary degree from Amherst College. For her work as a novelist, poet, and editor of eight volumes of her aunt Emily Dickinson's writings, the honor of Doctor of Letters was bestowed on Bianchi.

One of the founders of the Keats-Shelley Memorial, Bianchi was one of the eight Americans gathered by Robert Underwood Johnson to plan for the purchase and restoration of Piazza di Spagna, 26, the house in which Keats died. The goals of the group included establishing in the house a library of the works of John Keats and Percy Bysshe Shelley and providing for perpetual care of the graves of the poets.

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