Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-dh8gc Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-20T00:47:47.389Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Female Seminary Movement and Woman's Mission in Antebellum America

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 July 2009

Leonard I. Sweet
Leonard I. Sweet*
Affiliation:
president of the United Thelogical Seminary, Dayton, Ohio.
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

The years 1820–1850 were characterized by a remarkable transition in American education. A decisive shift occurred in the philosophy and patterns of educating American women which would have marked social, economic, and political ramifications in antebellum America. In the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, females were seen as weaker intellectually than males; they were denied the right to an equal education with males; and they were educated haphazardly, with few formal opportunities beyond a district school education for any but the rich. Even the “advanced” education at dame schools, boarding schools, and female academies sought only to further domestic skills, social polish, and parlor savvy.

Type
Research Article
Information
Church History , Volume 54 , Issue 1 , March 1985 , pp. 41 - 55
Copyright
Copyright © American Society of Church History 1985

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1. Beatty, Charles C., Lecture on the Formation of Female Character (Steubenville, 1848), p. 12.Google Scholar William, Rogers Chapman, Education of Daughters: An Address Delivered at the Close of the First Term of the Union Springs Young Ladies Seminary (Aurora, 1852), p. 17.Google Scholar

2. Ellwood, Patterson Cubberley, Public Education in the United States: A Study and Interpretation of American Educational History (Cambridge, Mass., 1947), p. 185.Google Scholar

3. See Kathryn, Kish Sklar, “The Founding of Mt. Holyoke College,” in Women of America: A History, ed. Carol, Ruth Berkin and Mary, Beth Norton (Boston, 1979), pp. 179–180.Google Scholar

4. Quoted in Isaac, Ferris, Address Delivered 27th April, 1839, at the Opening of the Rutgers Female Institute, New York (New York, 1839), pp. 11–12 Google Scholar; Thomas, Spencer, An Address Delivered at the First Anniversary of the Elizabethtown Female Seminary, July 23, 1857 (Cincinnati, 1857), p. 3 Google Scholar; Stanton, R. L., Female Heroism: An Address Delivered Before the Literary Societies of the Oxford Female College, June 24, 1857 (Cincinnati, 1857), p. 5 Google Scholar; Transactions of the Eighth Annual Meeting of the Western Literary Institute and College of Professional Teachers: Held in Cincinnati, October 1838 (Cincinnati, 1839), p. 16.Google Scholar

5. Alexander, Watson, A Lecture Delivered April 26, 1845, Before the Members of the Albany Female Academy (Albany, 1845), p. 20 Google Scholar; Robert, Davidson, The Study of History: An Address Delivered at the Anniversary of the Freehold Young Ladies' Seminary (Freehold, N.J., 1853).Google Scholar See also Emerson, Davis, An Address Delivered at the Sixteenth Anniversary of the Mt. Holyoke Female Seminary, August 4, 1853 (Northhampton, 1853) p. 3 Google Scholar, when Davis complains about female education being a “trite and threadbare topic on which nothing new or startling can be said.” He went on to “re-discuss” it anyway due to the pressures of the occasion; Fisher, Samuel W., John Calvin and John Wesley: An Address Delivered July 17, 1856, on the First Anniversary of the Western Female Seminary, Oxford, Ohio (Cincinnati, 1856), p. 49.Google Scholar

6. Reuben, Thomas Durrett, “The Sublime Effects of a Liberal Female Education,” Address Delivered at the Public Examination of W. F. Broaddus's Female Academy, Shelbyville, 26 07 1849, pp. 6, 8, Reuben Thomas Durrett Papers, Filson Club, Louisville, Ky. Google Scholar; Hamilton, W. T., A Plea for the Liberal Education of Women: An Address Delivered at. … Marion, Perry County, Alabama, 07 17, 1845 (New York, 1845), p. 20 Google Scholar; Heyworth, J., Observations on the Principles of Correct Education, 2d ed. (Buffalo, 1823), p. 3 Google Scholar; Daniel, Clark Eddy, The Young Woman's Friend (Boston, 1857), pp. 130–138.Google Scholar

7. This is stated quite starkly by Charles, Elliott, a professor of Greek at Miami University, in The Fireside: An Address Delivered Before the Calliopean Society of the Oxford Female Institute, June 21, 1951 (Hamilton, Ohio, 1851), p. 6.Google Scholar

8. Sprague, William B., An Address Delivered at the Opening of the Brooklyn Female Academy, on Monday Evening, May 4, 1845 (Albany, 1846), p. 12.Google Scholar

9. Catalogue of the Offices and Members of the Female Collegiate Institute, Georgetown, Kentucky (Georgetown, 1839), p. 15.Google Scholar See also Elliott, , Fireside, p. 22.Google Scholar

10. Sprague, , Address, p. 11.Google Scholar

11. Undated newspaper clipping from the Cincinnati Daily Gazette, describing the 1859 commencement exercises, in Daniel Tenney Scrapbook, Western College Alumni Association Archives, Oxford, Ohio.

12. Chapman, , Education of Daughters, p. 18 Google Scholar; Spalding, James R., The True Idea of Female Education: An Address Delivered at Pittsfield, Massachusetts, Before the Young Ladies'. Institute, At its Annual Commencement, August 22, 1855 (New York, 1855), p. 16.Google Scholar

13. Norton, John L., “Woman's Mission,” in Ninth Annual Announcement of the Henry Female College, New Castle, Kentucky, 1859 (Louisville, 1859), p. 19.Google Scholar See also M. G. F. to McDonald, M. A., 2 05 1838, McDonald-Lawrence Collection, Southern Historical Collection, University of North Carolina Library, Chapel Hill (hereafter cited as SHC).Google Scholar

14. Chapman, , Education of Daughters, p. 6.Google Scholar

15. Doak, A. Alexander, Address to the Young Ladies of the Greenville Female Academy, March 6th, 1847 (Knoxville, 1847), p. 15.Google Scholar See also Beatty, , Lecture, pp. 13–14.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

16. “Female Education,” Somerville Register, 8 06 1839, as found in Edgar Knight Papers, #1662, SHC.Google Scholar

17. Stanton, , Female Heroism, p. 20 Google Scholar; Joel, Hawes, An Address Delivered at the Eighth Anniversary of the Mt. Holyoke Female Seminary, South Hadley, Mass., July 31, 1845 (Boston, 1845), pp. 8, 9.Google Scholar See also Tappan, Henry P., A Discourse on Education Delivered at the Anniversary of the Young Ladies' Institute, Pittsfield, Massachusetts, October 2, 1846 (New York, 1846), p. 11 Google Scholar; and Eddy, , The Young Woman's Friend, pp. 137, 133.Google Scholar

18. John, Angell James, as quoted in Joshua Priestly, True Womanhood: Memorials of Eliza Hessel (London, 1859), p. 299 Google Scholar; Hamilton, , A Plea, p. 9.Google Scholar See also John, Henry Hopkins, The American Citizen (New York, 1857), p. 354.Google Scholar

19. See as an example the publicity for the Macon Female Academy run by a minister and his wife, in the Memphis Daily Eagle, 17 August 1848, and Mary, Lyon's “Mt. Holyoke Female Seminary,” Old South Leaflets. No. 145 (n.p., n.d.), p. 4.Google Scholar

20. Rev. S. Anthony to William P. Graham, 15 September 1841, William P. Graham Papers, SHC.

21. Mrs. E. H. Sivley to Jane Sivley, 20 May 186(?), Jane Sivley Papers, SHC. For evidence that parents who could not send their daughters to seminary still strove to provide arrangements for the learning of Latin, see Virginia Shelby to Jamor Thomas H. Shelby, 8 February 1839, Grigsby Collection, Virginia (Hart) Shelby Breckenridge Papers, Filson Club.

22. McGill, Alexander T., “The Present Age, The Age of Woman”: An Address Before the Literary Societies of Oxford Female College, at their Anniversary, June 24th, 1858 (Oxford, 1858), p. 7.Google Scholar

23. Scrapbook of Daniel Tenney, Western College Alumni Association Archives.

24. Western Protestant, Bardstown, Ky., 11 08 1838, p. 3.Google Scholar

25. Hopkins, , American Citizen, pp. 354, 355–358.CrossRefGoogle Scholar For Hopkins's attempts at raising money for the establishment of an Episcopal girls' school, see John, Henry Hopkins Jr., The Life of the Late Right Reverend John Henry Hopkins (New York, 1873), pp. 317–318.Google Scholar

26. Smith, Luther M., Thorough Female Education: An Address Delivered at the Commencement of LaGrange Female College, LaGrange, Georgia, July 9th and 10th (Atlanta, 1856), p. 6 Google Scholar; McGill, , “The Present Age,” p. 4 Google Scholar; Spalding, , True Idea, p. 24 Google Scholar; Hamilton, , A Plea, p. 22.Google Scholar See also an Oxford Female College circular distributed in 1855, which is quoted in Olive, Flower, The History of Oxford College for Women, 1830–1928, (Hamilton, Ohio, 1949), pp. 23–24.Google Scholar

27. Joseph, Emerson, Female Education: A Discourse, Delivered at the Dedication of the Seminary Hall in Saugus, January 5, 1822 (Boston, 1822)Google Scholar; Chapman, , Education of Daughters, p. 5.Google Scholar See also Stanton, , Female Heroism, p. 1.Google Scholar

28. Isaac, Ferris, Address Delivered 27th April, 1839, p. 14.Google Scholar

29. For “republican motherhood” and its role in female education see Linda, Kerber, “The Republican Mother: Women and the Enlightenment—An American Perspective,” American Quarterly 28 (Summer 1976): 187–205 Google Scholar; and Catherine, Clinton, “Equally Their Due: The Education of the Planter Daughter in the Early Republic,” Journal of the Early Republic 2 (Spring 1982): 39–60.Google Scholar

30. Moffat's, J. C. “Dedicatory Address” found in Joseph Warren, Address on the Missionary Feature of the Institution, Delivered at the Dedication of Oxford Female College, September 3, 1856 (Cincinnati, 1856), p. 25.Google Scholar

31. Spalding, , Liberal Education, p. 8 Google Scholar; also see Chapman, , Education of Daughters, p. 11.Google Scholar

32. William, Greenleaf Eliot, Lectures to Young Women (Boston, 1854), p. 108.Google Scholar

33. Moffat, , “Dedicatory Address,” pp. 27, 28.Google Scholar While the end of a seminary education was not the career of wife and mother, there was a constant backdrag of concern about not going too far. One can see this in Spalding, , Liberal Education, p. 8.Google Scholar

34. Spalding, , True Idea, p. 7 Google Scholar; Moffat, , “Dedicatory Address,” pp. 19–39 Google Scholar; and Charles, Elliot, Fireside, pp. 20–21.Google Scholar

35. Doak, , Address, pp. 3–14.Google Scholar

36. “Female Institutions—No. 2,” Western Protestant, 12 08 1837 Google Scholar; see also Moffat, , “Dedicatory Address, p. 28.Google Scholar

37. Rockwell, , Address, p. 15.Google Scholar

38. Second Annual Announcement of Daughters College, Near Harrodsburg, Kentucky (Cincinnati, 1857), p. 6 Google Scholar; History of Daughters College, pp. 18–19.Google Scholar

39. Stanton, , Female Heroism, p. 25.Google Scholar See also Chapman, , “Address,” p. 11 Google Scholar; and Chapman, , Lecture, p. 13.Google Scholar

40. Isabella Miller to Jane Constance Miller, 23 August 1840, Laurens Hinton Papers, SHC.

41. Beatty, , Lecture, pp. 11–12.Google Scholar

42. Davis, , Address, p. 12.Google Scholar

43. For an example of this kind of attack on women's education, see Pioneer, : A Narrative of the Nativity, Experience, Travels, and Ministerial Labors of Rev. Charles Giles (New York, 1844), p. 295.Google Scholar

44. Elias, Marks, Hints on Female Education, With an Outline of an Institution for the Education of Females, Termed the South Carolina Female Institute (Columbia, 1828), p. 15.Google Scholar

45. Elliott, , Fireside, p. 17.Google Scholar

46. Hamilton, , A Plea, p. 14.Google Scholar

47. Quoted in Page Putnam, Miller, “The Evolving Role of Women in the Presbyterian Church in the Early Nineteenth Century” (Ph.D. diss., University of Maryland, 1979), p. 280.Google Scholar See also Rockwell, , Address, p. 12.Google Scholar

48. Beatty, , Lecture, p. 15 Google Scholar; Stanton, , Female Heroism, pp. 10, 14–15.Google Scholar

49. Durrett, , “The Sublime Effects,” p. 13.Google Scholar

50. Undated newspaper clipping from the Cincinnati Daily Gazette describing Rev. C. B. Boynton's address to 1859 graduates of Western Female College, Rev. Daniel Tenney Scrapbook, Western College Alumni Association Archives, Oxford, Ohio.

51. Stanton, , Female Heroism, p. 9 Google Scholar; Beatty, , Lecture, p. 21.Google Scholar

52. Chapman, , Education of Daughters, p. 15.Google Scholar

53. Spalding, , True Idea, pp. 10, 13, 16.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

54. Ibid., p. 17; Circular and Annual Catalogue of the Allen Lodge Female College, Glasgow, Kentucky for 1858–1859 (Glasgow, 1858), p. 14.Google Scholar

55. McGill, , “The Present Age,” p. 8.Google Scholar

56. The southern lawyer R. T. Durrett conjectured that if there were any difference in the intellectual endowments of males and females, it was probably in favor of the latter. See Durrett's “The Sublime Effects.”

57. Appeal for the Oxford Female College, to the Churches of the Cincinnati, and other Western Synods (n.p., n.d.), p. 2.Google Scholar

58. Western Review and Miscellaneous Magazine 4 (1821): 48 Google Scholar, as quoted in Parrish, Gladys V., “The History of Female Education in Lexington and Fayette Counties (Kentucky),” (M. A. thesis, University of Kentucky, 1932), p. 23 Google Scholar; Circular and Annual Catalogue of the New Albany Female Seminary, New Albany, Indiana. For 1858–9 (New Albany, 1858), p. 13.Google Scholar Also see Tappan, Henry P., Discourse, p. 38.Google Scholar See also Rockwell, , Address, pp. 8, 10 Google Scholar; and Circular and Annual Catalogue, Glasgow, Kentucky, pp. 16–17.Google Scholar

59. Third Annual Catalogue and Circular of Oxford Female College, at Oxford, Ohio, May 1857 (Cincinnati, 1857), p. 18.Google Scholar

60. John, Burgess, Pleasant Recollections of Characters and Works of Noble Men (Cincinnati, 1887), p. 171.Google Scholar

61. Chapman, , Education of Daughters, pp. 6, 11.Google Scholar

62. Tappan, , Discourse, p. 40.Google Scholar

63. Davis, , Address, p. 9.Google Scholar

64. Keith, Melder, “Mask of Oppression: The Female Seminary Movement in the United States,” New York History 55 (1974): 261–279 Google Scholar; Nancy, Green, “Female Education and School Competition: 1820–1850,” History of Education Quarterly 18 (1978): 129–142 Google Scholar; Ellis, Elizabeth L., “Educating Daughters of the Patriarchy: Female Academies in the American South, 1830–1860,” (senior honors thesis, Harvard College, 1982)Google Scholar; Miller, , “The Evolving Role of Women in the Presbyterian Church,” pp. 266–293 Google Scholar; Catherine, Clinton, “Equally Their Due: The Education of the Planter Daughter in the Early Republic,” Journal of the Early Republic 2 (1982): 39–60.Google Scholar

65. Sweet, Leonard I., The Minister's Wife: Her Role in Nineteenth-Century Evangelicalism (Philadelphia, 1983).Google Scholar