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Home : Quarterly Archives : Volume 23 |
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Tredyffrin Easttown Historical Society |
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Source: April 1985 Volume 23 Number 2, Pages 45–54 The Berwyn Lyceum In the fall of 1878 the Berwyn Hall, on Church Avenue (now Main Street) opened. Within a few months it became the site of the Berwyn Lyceum that was soon established in the rapidly growing little village. The Hall was built by "The Berwyn Hall and Library Association", which had been incorporated the previous May. Its object was "the erection of a hall for public and private use, and the maintenance of a public library". The Hall was a two-story building, twenty-six feet wide and forty feet long, built at a cost of about $2,000 and completed in September. The formal opening of the Hall was held on October 17, 1878with a supper and promenade concert, for which an admission fee of 50 cents was charged. The library, "supplied with daily papers, magazines and books of general information", opened its reading rooms on the ground floor of the Hall on the following New Year's Day. Three weeks later, on January 21, 1879, the first meeting of the Berwyn Lyceum was held, in the large hall on the upper floor. The room extended the full length and width of the building. Both the library and lyceum were reflections of the widespread interest in adult education in the latter half of the nineteenth century. As early as in the 1820's the lyceum movement, dedicated to the "general diffusion of knowledge", had its beginnings in New England. Originally the lyceum served primarily as a platform for traveling speakers; among the better known lyceum lecturers were Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Bayard Taylor, Henry Ward Beecher, and Isaac Hayes, the polar explorer. In smaller towns and villages, places "off the beaten track", however, lyceums were organized with local people - frequently school teachers - as the speakers. By 1858 it was noted in Harper's Magazine, "The lyceum - a course of miscellaneous winter lectures in towns and villages all through the country - had now become a fixed institution." (In the previous year there had been a Chester Valley Lyceum in Howellville and the Franklin Lyceum at Leopard, the two centers of population in this area at that time. In each place they were held in the school house building.) With its new Hall in 1878, the village of Berwyn could now accommodate one. It got off to a good start. On January 11, 1879 it was reported in the West Chester Daily Local News, "The Berwyn lyceum, recently started at that place, is in a flourishing condition. There are about thirty-five members, who will meet every Tuesday evening." At the first meeting ten days later, which was "well attended", twelve more members were elected. As might be expected, Isaac A. Cleaver was one of its leading proponents; he was also officially the vice-president, but served as chairman at all the Tuesday night meetings in the usual absence of the president. (in addition to being the proprietor of the local general store, Cleaver was the postmaster, a school director, a deacon in his church and Sunday School superintendent, among other activities in Berwyn!) While the local school teachers and music teachers took an important part in the Lyceum's proceedings, the new lyceum also drew upon the talents of others in the community. Among the teachers participating were Abbie Eyre, who had recently been appointed to teach at the Glassley School to replace a Miss Ruth Worrall; Annie Wertz, the teacher at the Mt. Airy School in Daylesford, who later married a William Bigler Miller and became "well known in some of Philadelphia's best society circles"; and Lizzie Criley, graduated in 1876 from the West Chester Normal School. Private school teachers active in the program included James T. Doran, a "genius" at mathematics who conducted a classical school, first in Berwyn and later in Malvern, and a Miss Freeman, who with her sister, Mrs. Doran, ran the Spring Cottage Seminary before it was absorbed into Doran's school. Another regular participant was "Professor" John Kauffman, the "sweet singer" who had enlisted in the Civil War as a musician and who conducted a singing school in Berwyn in addition to his work as a surveyor and conveyancer. On several occasions, "scholars" from some of the local schools took part in the program. Other members of the community who participated in the various presentations included, inevitably, Isaac Cleaver, his wife Lizzie, their daughter Jennie, and their son "Master" Eugene. Also frequently on hand were John Campbell, a traveling wall paper salesman whose hobby was elocution; Enos R. Lewis, a contracting painter who loved to quote Shakespeare; and Frank H, Stauffer, writer of many childrens' stories, a frequent contributor to a number of leading magazines and periodicals, and the author of several books and poems, his wife Etta, and their son Marshall. Occasional presentations were also made by Sam Kromer, telegrapher and hotel keeper; P. W. Lobb, a feed, lumber and coal dealer, and his sister Ida; and by Harry Burns, the owner and operator of the planing mill and the builder of sixteen railroad stations along the Main Line as well as several schools and churches and numerous homes; along with other townspeople. As it was observed in the Berwyn Herald, "There is talent among our young people that should be fostered." On two or three occasions people from out of town also appeared on the program. In February, for example, a Miss Lillie Buddy, of Philadelphia, sang an alto solo, "a beautiful song, and well executed". On the following week Maud Marshall, of Bryn Mawr, gave a declamation, and the week after that a Mrs. Wilson, also from Philadelphia, favored the audience with a song "well rendered". The typical Tuesday night program included essays, declamations, selected readings, recitations, monologues, dialogues or skits, tableaux, and occasional musical offerings, as well as "answers to referred questions "and group singing, usually favorite hymns, led by "Professor" Kauffman, with an organ accompaniment. The referred questions, incidentally, covered a wide range of subjects. "Who were the alchemists?"; "What is parliamentary usage when an amendment is offered destroying the original meaning?"; "Who was the author of 'Mother Goose Melodies'?"; or "What is the value of the Queen of England's Crown?" are typical examples. (On a more frivolous note one night the question "Why is the Berwyn Lyceum a dangerous place to spend the evening?" was asked, to which Miss Annie Wertz replied, "Because it has a sharp Cleaver in it!".) While admission to the Lyceum was initially free, men could join it as members for 25 cents a month, to meet the expenses of the rental of the Hall. There was no charge for women to become members, however. As previously noted, the series started auspiciously. The first session was, according to newspaper accounts, "well attended", while two weeks later "the house was crowded with a very intelligent audience". Although on the following week a "storm had the effect of keeping many at home,... there was quite a good audience gathered from our village and the country", and by February 25th it was again noted that the "house was filled with an appreciative audience". Despite the good attendance, however, at the Meeting on March 11th it was unaminously agreed "that, in view of the deficit in our treasury, we charge an admission fee of ten cents to our Lyceum for the evening of Tuesday next, the 18th of March". Even so, it was reported the following week that the "house was full, notwithstanding the admission fee of ten cents". It was further noted that "the chair thanked the audience for their liberal response to the call for aid to pay the 'incidental expenses', and also for their good attention, and invited them to future sessions, which would be free". Following the meeting on March 25th, however, no meeting was held on the next two Tuesdays, and when the Lyceum did reconvene on April 15th, it was later reported, "Owing to it not being generally known that it would meet, the hall was but half filled, and many were absent who had parts assigned them in the programme". Due to an unfortunate tragedy, the meeting on March 4th was adjourned after the recess. During the recess, vice-president Cleaver was notified of the sudden death of Reese Lewis, one of the members of the Lyceum, who had been killed when struck by a train while crossing the railroad tracks in Green Tree. He had appeared on the program three weeks earlier, with selected readings from the works of Shakespeare. The Lyceum closed for the season in April, it being announced at the April 22d meeting that "agreeably to the action of the Lyceum, with this meeting its season would close until the coming fall months", "This is the first winter for this Lyceum," it was noted in the Local. "and everybody says it has been a success, and all look forward to the pleasant meetings in prospect when it shall again reorganize," On the following December l6th it was reported, "The Lyceum at Berwyn will reorganize about the beginning of the year, and will be held as heretofore in Berwyn Hall." A month later there was an item noting, "A meeting of the Berwyn Lyceum will be held on Saturday evening next. The program will consist of select readings by John Campbell, T. C. Morton and Isaac A. Cleaver; an essay by F. H, Stauffer, and declamation by Miss Cora E, Webster." But that apparently was its "swan song", as no reference to the Berwyn Lyceum can be found in succeeding issues of the Local, Its first successful season was apparently also its last. The programs for the 1879 season, as reconstructed from the reports in the Daily Local News, are on the following pages.
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