Women -- Employment -- United States; Women -- Social and moral questions
Associated with Mrs. Willard at Troy, in the department of science, was
her distinguished sister, Mrs. Almira Lincoln Phelps. Later she was the
head of “Patapsco Institute,” a female diocesan school of high
reputation. She was the second woman elected a member of the “American
Association for Advancement of Science,” and in 1866 read before that
body a paper on “The Religious and Scientific Character and Writings of
Edward Hitchcock,” and in 1878, one on “The Infidel Tendencies of Modern
Science.” Her educational works on botany, chemistry, geology, and
natural philosophy had a large circulation.
Names which soon rose to high distinction in educational work were those
of Miss Grant and Miss Lyon, of Massachusetts, Miss Catherine Fiske of
Keene, N. H., Miss Catherine Beecher of Connecticut, and the Misses
Longstreth of Philadelphia, Pa.
The work of Miss Fiske was nearly cotemporary with that of Mrs. Willard.
For twenty-three years, up to her death in 1836, she carried on a school
which received some 2500 pupils to a course of study which embraced
botany, chemistry, astronomy, and “Watts on the Mind.”
Miss Catherine Beecher, who was endowed with the marked individuality of
her family, conducted a seminary at Hartford, Conn., from 1822 to 1832,
and later one at Cincinnati, O. Her course of study included Latin, and
calisthenic training was a conspicuous feature. She gave prominence in
her instruction to the worth of domestic skill.
She wrote text-books on mental and moral philosophy and upon theology,
and did not forget to prove by publishing “a domestic receipt book,”
that, though learned, she had not soared above the true sphere of woman.
To the schools already mentioned came pupils from every State in the
Union, either from families of means or to receive the generosity of the
principals.
Mary Lyon was born among the Massachusetts hills in 1797, and graduated
from the position of teacher in the little schoolhouses, and again as a
student from Byfield Academy; then from the charge of Adams Academy at
Derry, N. H., and from a like position in Ipswich Academy, Mass., in
both which she was associated with Miss Grant. To her was due the
conception of “a school which shall put within reach of students of
moderate means such opportunities that the wealthy cannot find better
ones.”
To the execution of her plan the gathering of a few thousand dollars was
necessary. The labor involved may be inferred from the fact that in the
list of contributions the sum of fifty cents repeatedly appears. The
most serious obstacles were found in the antagonism to what seemed to
many a needless project. Said Dr. Hitchcock: “Respectable periodicals
were charged with sarcasm and enmity to Miss Lyon’s plans. She remained
unruffled.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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