33 



Upham of Salem, at the request of the Institute, on the life and char- 

 acter. of its late President, Francis Peabody. 



The services were opened by the President with the following brief 

 remarks : — 



We are assembled this afternoon to listen to the reading of a me- 

 moir prepared by Hon. Charles W. Upham at the request of the Insti- 

 tute on the life and character of our late President, Francis Peabody. 

 He was from the beginning a constant friend of this Institution, and 

 for the last two and a half years the president. In his last eflbrt for 

 the cause of science in this community he was only permitted to take 

 a few of the initiatory steps, leaving the furtherance of the plans to 

 be accomplished by the surviving associates in the trust, or by his 

 or their successors. 



On occasions of this nature the mind involuntarily runs back into the 

 past and calls to recollection those who have in their day and genera- 

 tion been instrumental in the moulding of the various institutions 

 which have for their objects the amelioration of man. 



Some one hundred and ten years since at a meeting of the Monday 

 Evening Club composed of the leading spirits of that day, the 

 Brownes, Pickmans, Ornes, Higginson, Lyndes and Olivers, the plan 

 of organizing the Social Library was matured. Some twenty years 

 later the Philosophical Library was called into existence by Holyoke, 

 Prince, Barnard and Orne of Salem, Willard and Fisher of Beverly, 

 and Cutler of the Hamlet, now Hamilton. Thirty years pass away 

 and we behold Bowditch, Story, Pickering, Silsbee and Putnam, or- 

 ganizing the Athenaeum, taking the two libraries above named, as the 

 basis of the new Institution. Ten years later. White, Tucker, Salton- 

 stall, King and Ward are interested in the formation of an historical 

 society, to preserve the rich materials everywhere then abundant to 

 elucidate the history of this section of our good old Commonwealth. 

 Another decade of years pass, Peabody, Webb, Cole, Phillips and Peir- 

 son are preparing courses of lectures on literature and science adapted 

 to the popular mind, and hence arose that system of lectures which has 

 been so prevalent throughout the country for the past thirty or forty 

 years and which has been a great auxiliary to the cause of general 

 education. After the lapse of some three or four years Nichols of 

 Danvers, Oakes of Ipswich, Perry of Bradford, Page and Ives of Salem, 

 laid the groundwork for a society of natural history to develop a 

 taste for this study and to extend researches into the various depart- 

 ments of nature. 



In this connection let us allude to the labors of Hodges, Lambert, 

 Carpenter, Osgood, Crowninshield, Nichols and others in organizing 

 the East India Marine Society in 1799, and consequent thereupon the 

 forming of the valuable Museum which has had a world renowned 

 reputation, and which, with the scientific collections of this society, 

 is being rearranged in the East India Marine Hall, recently obtained 

 and fitted up with galleries and cases for their reception through the 

 liberality of a son of Essex, whom governments and crowned heads 

 delight to honor. 



Some of the above named persons were interested in several of 

 these institutions ; thus, for instance, the venerable Dr. Edward Au- 

 gustus Holyoke was one of tlie original members of the Social Library 

 in 17G0, and at the time of his death in 1829, was president of the 

 Athenaeum and also of the Historical Society, haying held that office 



PROCEEDINGS ESSEX INST., VOL. VI. 6 NOV., 1868. 



