ABSTRACT
Libraries were a long-standing feature of life in the New World, although they remained small and exclusive throughout much of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Lecturers on the lyceum circuit-from Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau to a young Abe Lincoln and the leading voices of the abolitionist and women's rights movements-typically would deliver their lectures on winter evenings at a centrally located building in the community. The antebellum era witnessed the emergence of two new types of libraries-research library and public library; developing the American culture. The purpose of the apprentice's library was to allow the urban poor to improve themselves and their employment prospects while occupying their time with a wholesome alternative to other pastimes the city offered. The relationship between lecturer and audience, according to Holbrook, was critically important to the success of the lyceum. The Civil War interrupted the lyceum movement, though it flourished again once the conflict ended.
