Lyceum movement

During this period hundreds of informal associations were established for the purpose of improving the social, intellectual, and moral fabric of society.

Holbrook was a traveling lecturer and teacher who believed that education was a lifelong experience, and intended to create a National American Lyceum organization that would oversee this method of teaching.

Transcendentalists such as Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau endorsed the movement and gave speeches at many local lyceums.

[2] After the American Civil War, lyceums were increasingly used as a venue for travelling entertainers, such as vaudeville and minstrel shows.

Notable public figures such as Susan B. Anthony, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Victoria Woodhull, Anna Dickinson, Josiah Gilbert Holland, Mark Twain, and William Lloyd Garrison, all spoke at lyceums in the late 19th century.

The Lyceum Magazine, Chicago . The magazine worked toward the movement's goals of improving society by its advertisements of event choices for members to sponsor for their communities.