Born in Eugene, Oregon, the daughter of Ethel Gale Brewer and Wilson Price Wilhelm. She was educated in Oregon, Ohio and Washington. For most of her life she lived on the West Coast of America, in and around the San Francisco bay Area. In 1935 she spent some time in new York City, working as an associate editor of Literary America.

In the ten years between 1935 and 1945, Wilhelm published a few poems, several short stories, and six brief novels; however, she spent the last forty-six years of her life without further literary production.

Following a 10 years long relationship with Helen Hope Rudolph Page, she settled with her second lover, who has chosen to remain anonymous, in Berkeley where they happily lived from 1948 until Wilhelm's death.

Wilhelm had an independent income that enabled them to live without the necessity of having to earn a living. She died at age eighty-three.