Mary Lyon

Hello! My name is Mary Lyon and I was born on February 28, 1797 on a remote New England farm. I acquired my first teaching job at the age of 17 years old. My job paid me 75 cents a week. However this was far less than the pay a man would get for the same position as a teacher. Nonetheless I had a passion to work hard and improve my teaching. But maintaining a classroom was always a hard task. During this time I moved around a lot- sometimes only staying five days at a house and then moving on. Despite my low pay I realized as I was teaching that I wanted to further my education, even if it would be a financial burden on me. I tried to enroll in schools regardless of how long the trips were, and over the next twenty years I taught at other schools in western and eastern Massachusetts, and in southern New Hampshire. And as my experience grew I became able to manage schools and had an urge to expand academic opportunities for young women. I eventually founded Mount Holyoke Female Seminary after much turmoil and hardships and I set standards so that this was not just another school but one that would prove separate from other women seminaries. My goal was to create a school with a curriculum equivalent to those at men's colleges, minimum entrance age of 17, low tuition, rigorous entrance examinations, permanence, domestic work by students, independence, and a wide base of financial support. “There is nothing in the universe that I fear, but that I shall not know all my duty, or shall fail to do it.” But in the end I was able to get a charter in 1836 and Mount Holyoke Female Seminary finally opened on November 8, 1837 with 80 students. My aim was to give an opportunity for women to break the traditional roles of society and better their education. “ I have the greatest confidence that a system might be formed by which all the domestic work of a family of 100 could be performed by the young ladies themselves, & in most perfect order, without any sacrifice of improvement in knowledge or refinement. Might not this simple feature do away much of the prejudice against female education among common people? If this prejudice could by any means be removed, how much would it do for the cause.”