David Gordon Lyon

David Gordon Lyon
Born	(1852-05-24)May 24, 1852 Benton, Alabama
Died	December 4, 1935(1935-12-04) (aged 83) Boston, Massachusetts
Education	Howard College Southern Baptist Theological Seminary University of Leipzig
Occupation	Theologian
Spouses	Tosca Woehler ​ ​ (m. 1883; died 1904)​ Mabel E. Harris ​ ​ (m. 1910; died 1931)​

David Gordon Lyon (May 24, 1852 – December 4, 1935) was an American theologian.

Biography

David Gordon Lyon was born in Benton, Alabama on May 24, 1852, the son of a doctor.[1][2] In 1875 he received his AB from Howard College in Marion, Alabama. (Howard is now Samford University and located in Birmingham). He studied at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary under Crawford Howell Toy, and went to Germany, and received his PhD from the University of Leipzig in 1882, in the study of Syriac.[3] While there, he met Tosca Woehler, whom he married in 1883.[4]

He occupied the Hollis Chair at Harvard Divinity School[5] from 1882[6] to 1910, when he assumed the Hancock professorship of Hebrew and other Oriental languages.[7] Six years after Tosca Woehler's death (1904) he married Mabel E. Harris (d. 1931).[3][4] He was the founding curator[8] of the Semitic Museum.[9] He retired from Harvard in 1921.[7]

He died at Baker Memorial Hospital in Boston on December 4, 1935.[2]

Diaries

Diaries by David Gordon Lyon, opened to April 4–5, 1925

David Gordon Lyon kept a diary for over 30 years of his life. In 2014, the Semitic Museum began a project entitled "Harvard and the Ancient Near East: The David Gordon Lyon Diaries", to digitize and transcribe the volumes into a human and machine-readable form.[10]

References

1. "Recipients of Honorary Degrees". The Harvard Graduates' Magazine. Vol. X, no. XXXVII. September 1901. pp. 169–170. Retrieved May 5, 2023 – via Google Books.
2. "Dead of Dr David G. Lyon". The Boston Globe. December 4, 1935. p. 8. Retrieved May 5, 2023 – via Newspapers.com.
3. Pfeiffer, Robert H. (1936). "David Gordon Lyon (1852-1935)". Proceedings of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. 70 (10): 552–54. JSTOR 20023182.
4. Harvard Alumni Bulletin. Vol. XXXVIII. 1935. p. 387. Retrieved May 5, 2023 – via Google Books. In 1883 he married Tosca Woehler of Leipsic, Germany. She died in 1904, and in 1910 he married Mabel E. Harris. She died in 1931.
5. Unitarian year book. American Unitarian Association. 1902. p. 136.
6. "The History of the Divinity School". Harvard Alumni Bulletin. 1916. pp. 114–18. Retrieved May 5, 2023 – via Google Books.
7. "Prof. Lyon to retire: He becomes professor emeritus after 40 years' service at Harvard" (PDF). The New York Times. November 26, 1921. p. 13. Retrieved May 5, 2023.
8. "Founder of Semitic Museum, Professor of Languages, Dies: David G. Lyon Had Been Teaching at Harvard Since 1882". The Harvard Crimson. December 5, 1935. Retrieved December 24, 2010.
9. General catalogue issue. Harvard University, C.W. Sever. 1909. p. 660. Retrieved May 5, 2023 – via Google Books.
10. Stergios, Gosia; Morse, Christopher. "Harvard and the Ancient Near East: The David Gordon Lyon Diaries | Digital Pioneers @ Harvard University". Archived from the original on September 3, 2014. Retrieved May 5, 2023.