Wilder was born on May 19, 1871, at Diamond Hill, Cumberland, Rhode Island, the third and youngest child of parents Eliab Daniel and Sarah Whipple (née Wheaton).

[5][6] Her paper, entitled "The Ventral Surface of the Mammalian Chiridium: With Special Reference to the Conditions Found in Man",[7] summarized all prior knowledge of the field of genetics and dermatoglyphics, and was the most significant study of ridges in non-human animals of its time.

[9] Harris Wilder published widely on anatomy, genetics, and anthropology, and the two were known as the most prominent American researchers of fingerprint morphology of the early 20th century.

[11] The Wilders also assembled what was at the time the most active research program in salamander biology in the world, later joined by Emmett R.

In 1925 she published The Morphology of Amphibian Metamorphosis, a book in which she describes the comparative biology of D. fuscus, E. bislineata, and the newt Notophthalmus viridescens.