Anna Hatcher was a visiting professor at IU Bloomington prior to being appointed a professor of French and Italian and of Spanish and Portuguese in the College of Arts and Sciences in 1967 and was appointed to the Graduate School faculty that same year. She was named distinguished professor of French and Italian and of Spanish and Portuguese in 1970; she was the first woman to receive this title at IU. She retired in May 1976 and was named distinguished professor emeritus of French and Italian and of Spanish and Portuguese in July 1976. Upon her retirement, the Anna Granville Hatcher Prize was established at IU to be awarded annually to a graduate student “who best exemplifies scholarship in the Anna Hatcher tradition.” Hatcher received a B.A. from Blue Mountain College in 1925, an M.A. from the University of Virginia in 1927, and a Ph.D. in romance languages from Johns Hopkins University in 1934. She began her academic career as academic dean at Harcum Junior College in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania, a position she held until she resigned in 1938. She joined the faculty at Johns Hopkins University in 1939 and became a full professor in 1958; she was the first woman to reach this rank at JHU. She continued teaching there until she moved to IU in 1967.
Hatcher was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship from the John Simon Guggenheim Foundation in 1953 for linguistics and was a member of the Modern Language Association.
Hatcher passed away in 1978.