The Gloucester Lyceum of Gloucester, Massachusetts

Gloucester, Massachusetts

Gloucester is a city on Cape Ann in Essex County, Massachusetts, in the United States. It is part of Massachusetts' North Shore. The population was 28,789 at the 2010 U.S. Census...

, was an association for "the improvement of its members in useful knowledge, and the advancement of popular education

Popular education

Popular education is a concept grounded in notions of class, political struggle, and social transformation. The term is a translation from the Spanish educación popular or the Portuguese educação popular and rather than the English usage as when describing a 'popular television program,' popular...

." It incorporated in 1831.

From the 1830s through at least the 1860s, the Lyceum arranged lectures from notables such as: Ralph Waldo Emerson

Ralph Waldo Emerson

Ralph Waldo Emerson was an American essayist, lecturer, and poet, who led the Transcendentalist movement of the mid-19th century...

, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. was an American physician, professor, lecturer, and author. Regarded by his peers as one of the best writers of the 19th century, he is considered a member of the Fireside Poets. His most famous prose works are the "Breakfast-Table" series, which began with The Autocrat...

, "the two Everetts, Choate, Sumner, Rantoul, Winthrop, Colfax, Greely, ... Parker, Curtis, Phillips, Bayard Taylor

Bayard Taylor

Bayard Taylor was an American poet, literary critic, translator, and travel author.-Life and work:...

, Dr. Holland, Chapin, Starr King

Thomas Starr King

Thomas Starr King was an American Unitarian and Universalist minister, influential in California politics during the American Civil War. Starr King spoke zealously in favor of the Union and was credited by Abraham Lincoln with preventing California from becoming a separate republic...

, Hillard, ... Beecher, Giles, Gough, Dr. Hayes, the Arctic explorer, Burlingame, ... Alger, Whipple, Murdoch, Vanderhoff, Bancroft, and Dana." From 1830, "meetings were held in Union Hall ... until 1844 when the Murray Institute was used for one season prior to the occupancy of the Town Hall."

In 1854 "the Lyceum opened its library on Wednesday and Saturday afternoons and evenings, with 1,400 volumes. It was located in the eastern parlor of the residence of F.G. Low on what was then the corner of Spring and Duncan Streets." Patrons could use the library for $1 per year; the fee was waived for those unable to afford it. In 1863 the library moved to Front Street; the building burned down in 1864. Thereafter it occupied rooms on Middle Street (in the Baptist church), and later on Front Street (in the Babson block). Much of the funding for the library came from "Samuel E. Sawyer, a Boston

Boston

Boston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...

 merchant, but a native of Gloucester."

The Lyceum became the "Gloucester Lyceum and Sawyer Free Library" under a new charter in 1872.

Lectures/Performances

• 1830
  • Hosea Hildreth
  • William Ferson
  • Mr. Spencer
  • Benjamin Crowninshield
  • Charles G. Putnam
  • Henry Prentiss

• 1832
  • John James Babson

• 1834
  • Mr. Ward

• 1835
  • George S. Hillard
  • A.H. Everett
  • Jerome V.C. Smith
  • Ezekiel W. Leach
  • Rev. Mr. Sewall
  • Daniel P. King
  • Rev. Mr. Withington
  • Rev. Mr. Fox
  • Samuel E. Cowes
  • A.L. Peirson
  • Rev. Mr. Williams
  • Rev. Mr. Worcester
  • John S. Williams
  • Rev. Mr. Thompson
  • George H. Devereux
  • R.S. Edes

• 1848
  • Henry David Thoreau
    Henry David Thoreau
    Henry David Thoreau was an American author, poet, philosopher, abolitionist, naturalist, tax resister, development critic, surveyor, historian, and leading transcendentalist...
    
    

• 1858-1859
  • Henry Ward Beecher
  • Daniel C. Eddy
  • A.D. Mayo
  • Wendell Phillips
  • George Vandenhoff
  • George B. Loring
  • John G. Saxe
  • George D. Prentice

• 1860
  • Mendelssohn Quintette Club
    Mendelssohn Quintette Club
    The Mendelssohn Quintette Club based in Boston, Massachusetts, was one of "the most active and most widely known chamber ensemble[s] in America" in the latter half of the 19th-century...
    
    
  • Grace Greenwood
  • George Sumner
  • William W. Sylvester
  • William H. Millburn, "the blind preacher"
  • George William Curtiss, "author of Trumps"
  • Rufus Laighton Jr.
  • Benjamin H. Smith Jr.
  • William Hague