Martha Ellicott Tyson

Martha was born on September 13, 1795 to George Ellicott and Elizabeth (Brooke) Ellicott, who were members of a respected family of Maryland Quakers, the Ellicotts.[1] The family homestead was a stone house built in 1789 near the Patapsco River and the family's mill.[2] Her father often welcomed Native Americans to their home.

One of seven children, Martha was born and raised in Ellicott's Mills (now Ellicott City, Maryland),[3] which her grandfather, Andrew Ellicott and his brothers had founded. Her books recounted a Christmas visit with chief Little Turtle in 1807 when she was twelve years old.[1][4] Although she never completed formal schooling past primary education, she was well educated at home and fluent in French.

In 1815, Martha married Nathan Tyson, the son of Baltimore Quaker and abolitionist Elisha Tyson.[2][5][6]During his lifetime, Nathan Tyson served as the Baltimore Chamber of Commerce's first president and as the first president of the Baltimore Corn and Flour Exchange.[7][8][9] He had a "gracious love story" with his wife and they had a relaxed attitude about some Quaker conventions.[10][lower-alpha 1] Tyson was described as a "woman of much sweetness and dignity of bearing, possessed of an exceedingly cultivated mind and many accomplishments."[10]

The couple had twelve children, ten of whom reached adulthood and eight of whom reached middle-age.[1][2][8] Their children included James Tyson (died by or in early 1905), Elizabeth Brooke Tyson Smith, Henry Tyson, Isabella (died by 1905), Frederic Tyson, Robert Tyson, Lucy Tyson Fitzhugh and Anne Tyson Kirk.[8][11] Tyson ensured that both her sons and daughters received a good education.[1]

Nathan died on January 6, 1867,[12] and his funeral was held January 9, 1867. Leaders of the Baltimore Corn and Flour Exchange said of him, "the deceased presented to us, in his daily conduct, his known integrity, his uniform courtesy and goodness of heart".[9]

Martha was a member of the Little Falls Meetinghouse in Harford County.[13] At the age of 35, Tyson was chosen as an Elder of the Baltimore Quaker Meeting.[1] When she was 66, she was appointed as a minister, although she had been working in that capacity informally for years.[6] Tyson worked to improve educational opportunities for enslaved people and women[14] and, with her husband, helped found the Fallston Public Library.[6] At her suggestion, a committee on education was established at the Baltimore Yearly Meeting to prepare teachers and to focus on higher education of Quaker children.[6] She was an abolitionist.[14]

As a result of her dedication, support and interest in education, Martha became a co-founder of Swarthmore College.[1][6][15] She had tried unsuccessfully for ten years to found a college. Martha and her husband tried a new approach when they hosted a meeting in their home of Quaker leaders from New York, Pennsylvania, and Maryland. This meeting of 30 leaders propelled the movement to start the second coeducation college in the United States, providing new educational opportunities for women.

Founded in 1860 just prior to the American Civil War, Swarthmore College was established to provide: "A better educated generation that could achieve freedom, peace, prosperity, and righteousness."[1] Martha, who was a member of the college's Board of Managers, recruited for women professors by writing a letter to the president of Vassar College in 1863 that encouraged the hiring of women professors at the new institution.[6] The College opened after the War in 1869.[6]

Martha authored two biographical accounts of Benjamin Banneker, a free African-American farmer who became an almanac author and surveyor and acquired knowledge of astronomy, mathematics and natural history.[16] Banneker was a frequent visitor at Martha's childhood home, sharing a mutual enthusiasm for learning with the family.[6] Martha's father, George Ellicott, befriended and mentored Banneker, who lived a 1 mile (1.6 km) up a hill from the Ellicotts in what is now Oella, Maryland.[2][17]

Martha was eleven years old when Banneker died.[5][6] She conducted interviews and compiled the materials for her two biographies, the second of which was edited by her daughter Anne Tyson Kirk, who sought advice from Frederick Douglass.[6][18] The two biographies of Banneker are Sketch in the Life of Benjamin Banneker, published in 1854,[1][5][19] and the more complete Benjamin Banneker: The African-American Astronomer, published posthumously in 1884.[5][6][20]

Martha also wrote A Brief Account of the Settlement of Ellicott's Mills[21] and was a co-author, with Charles Worthington Evans and G. Hunter Bartlett, of American Family History: Fox, Ellicott, Evans.[22] She also wrote memoirs of family members, including one of Joseph Ellicott that the Maryland Historical Society printed.[23]

Encouraged by the Baltimore Yearly Meeting of Friends, Martha's father and Gerald T. Hopkins went to Fort Wayne, then part of the Northwest Territory, to meet with Native Americans. Hopkins kept a journal of the details of the trip, which Martha edited in 1862. She also wrote about the meetings that her father held with the United States government to discuss Native Americans.[1]

After experiencing declining health for about three months, Martha died on March 5, 1873 at the age of 77 years while surrounded by family members.[24][25] She was buried at Green Mount Cemetery in Baltimore.[24]

In 1910, John Russell Hayes wrote a poem entitled A Portrait of Martha Ellicott Tyson, which memorialized a work of art hanging on a wall at Swarthmore College.[26] Martha was inducted into the Maryland Women's Hall of Fame in 1988.[14]

Martha Ellicott Tyson came from a tradition that encouraged and appreciated the intellectual accomplishments of the family's women. During her life, Tyson, continued to encourage and support the rights of women and slaves to achieve the freedom necessary to reach their full potential. As a pioneering spiritual leader and minister of the Society of Friends, her life was moved by a desire to do good.

— Maryland Women's Hall of Fame[1]

Bedini, Silvio A. (1999). "Chapter XI: The Man Remembered". The Life of Benjamin Banneker: The First African-American Man of Science (2nd ed.). Baltimore: Maryland Historical Society. pp. 287–320. ISBN 0-938420-59-3. LCCN 98022848. OCLC 894558859. Retrieved January 17, 2021 – via Internet Archive.