Boston Mutual Lyceum

Not to be confused with Boston Lyceum.

Boston Mutual Lyceum

Formation	1883; 142 years ago (1883)
Founder	William Cooper Nell
Type	Lyceum
Location	Boston, USA
Region served	Greater Boston, Massachusetts, USA
President	Dudley Tidd
1st Vice President	Joel W. Lewis
2nd Vice President	Sarah H. Annible

Boston Mutual Lyceum was an African American lyceum organization[1] founded in 1833.[2]

Organization

It included women and had a female vice-president. Two of five managers were also women.[2] The Adelphic Union was an African American literary society in Boston at the same time.[3]

Officers were: Dudley Tidd, president; Joel W. Lewis, 1st vice-president; Sarah H. Annible, 2nd vice-president; Nath Cutler, secretary; and Thomas Dalton, treasurer. Managers were Joseph H. Gover, John B. Cutler, Henry Carroll, Lucy Lew wife of Thomas Dalton and daughter of Barzillai Lew, and Mary Williams. Josiah Holbrook helped organize the group.[1]

Tidd was a laborer[4] who became a property owner along with Dalton, who had been a bootblack.

The abolitionist newspaper The Liberator published by William Lloyd Garrison published a brief notice of the formation of the group listing its officers and managers.[5]

Lucy Lew Dalton is part of the Boston Women's Heritage Trail.[6]

See also

• Abiel Smith School
• Massasoit Guards

References

1. "The Abolitionist". Garrison and Knapp. December 5, 1833 – via Google Books.
2. Yellin, Jean Fagan; Horne, John C. Van (May 31, 2018). The Abolitionist Sisterhood: Women's Political Culture in Antebellum America. Cornell University Press. ISBN 9781501711428 – via Google Books.
3. Horton, James Oliver; Horton, Lois E. (December 5, 1999). Black Bostonians: family life and community struggle in the antebellum North. Holmes & Meier. ISBN 9780841913790 – via Google Books.
4. Horton, James Oliver; Horton, Lois E. (December 5, 1999). Black Bostonians: family life and community struggle in the antebellum North. Holmes & Meier. ISBN 9780841913806 – via Google Books.
5. "Agents" (PDF). The Liberator. Vol. III, no. 35. Boston, Mass.: William Lloyd Garrison and Isaac Knapp. Aug 31, 1833. p. 1. Retrieved Aug 7, 2024.
6. "Charlestown". bwht.org.