When Mary Lyon announced her intention of being a teacher, the community was astonished, not to say shocked. It was predicted that she would fail. Men, not women, were meant for the teaching profession! Mary's proficiency in her studies, however, could not be denied. Early and late she pored over her books; in four days, to the amazement of her teacher, she learned all of Alexander's Grammar and recited it perfectly. When she was thirteen, her mother married again and went to live in Ohio, but Mary remained on the farm and kept house for her only brother. He paid her one dollar a week—a large sum for a girl to earn in the year 1810.
For a while it looked as though her high ambitions would never be realized, but the brave girl did not know the word despair. She studied all she could and read every book she could lay her hands upon. After five years spent in this way her brother married and went away, leaving his sister free to do as she pleased.
Thus thrown entirely upon her own resources, Mary began her career as a teacher in Shelburne Falls. Seventy-five cents a week and board made up her munificent salary. By dint of spinning and weaving for some of the neighbors, she earned a little more. Luckily, she did not care for fine clothes or trinkets, so that at the age of twenty she had saved enough money to enable her to spend a term at Sanderson Academy at Ashfield. This was her great opportunity and she improved it well, making a real sensation in the school by her brilliancy. They say that when Mary Lyon stood up to recite, her class-mates laid aside their tasks to listen to her.
The term over, Mary planned to go back to teaching, for she had no money to continue her studies. It so happened that some of the trustees of the Academy, hearing of her unusual scholarship, offered her another term, tuition free. Mary thankfully accepted this favor, and doubtless, had wonderful dreams of the use she might make of all her knowledge when she should get it. But, first, she must plan some way to pay her board while studying. Among her possessions were some bedding, some table linen, and a few other household articles. These she succeeded in exchanging at a boarding house for a room and a seat at table. Her companions in the boarding house told of her that she slept but four hours, spending all the remainder of her time at her books.
But though she had now reached a point in scholarship where she could easily hold a position as teacher, Mary Lyon by no means considered her education completed. All her vacations were spent in the study of some branch in which she found herself deficient. She spent some time in the family of the Reverend Edward Hitchcock, afterward President of Amherst College, with whom she studied natural science, at the same time taking lessons in drawing and painting from his wife.
In 1821, at the age of twenty-four, Mary had saved enough money to enable her to enter the school of Reverend Joseph Emerson at Byfield. Her friends were strongly opposed to her going, telling her that she knew enough already; that, as she would never be a minister, it was unnecessary for her to study more. But Mary had other ideas, and could not be diverted from her purpose.
Mr. Emerson was a broad-minded man of very advanced notions for his day and generation. He actually believed that women could understand philosophical subjects as well as men and that, if their minds demanded good solid food, they ought to have it! His wife was a woman of much ability, and together they discussed questions of science and religion with their pupils.
It was undoubtedly these discussions that turned Mary Lyon's mind and thoughts to spiritual things. Heretofore, she had been so absorbed in her passion for general knowledge that the matter of religion had never touched her. Suddenly the fact burst upon her that all things in this life were useless and unsatisfying, except as they were used in helping humanity. From this time on, her work of teaching seemed little short of inspired.
When, later, an assistant was wanted at Sanderson Academy, notwithstanding the opposition of many who believed that a man should fill the place, Mary Lyon was selected for the position. Before long one of her former teachers, Miss F. P. Grant, sent for her to fill a higher position at Derry, New Hampshire. Mary delayed going in order to take some lessons in chemistry from Professor Eaton of Amherst.
The school in Derry numbered ninety pupils. It was held only during the summer months, and during the winter Mary again taught at Ashfield and Bucklands. She charged twenty-five cents a week for tuition, the scholars boarding with families in the vicinity, at the rate of $1.25 weekly. Meanwhile Miss Grant, who had removed to Ipswich, induced Miss Lyon to join her there. Together they conducted the Ipswich Academy, and together they worked out their ideas of what a school should be.