Eucleian and Philomathean joint meeting, Daniel D. Barnard and Edgar Allan Poe as lecturers in 1845
In October 1832, twelve students began the Philomathean Society at New York University.[1] The society's rival was the Eucleian Society. [1] While both societies forbade membership in their rival society, early records show that early members were sometimes expelled or resigned to join the rival society.
Student societies such as the Philomathean Society collected their own libraries and augmented the curriculum. Literary and debate societies offered a departure from the learn-by-rote instruction that prevailed in much of university instruction. The Philomathean Society provided its membership at NYU with a library and augmented student instruction. The university gave the society its own rooms at the Main University Building, which was "fitted up in a style of taste and elegance highly creditable to the young gentlemen members."[1]
One early lecturer became a very popular figure with the society. Edgar Allan Poe was a repeated guest of the Philomathean Society and the Eucleian Society, and lived on the Square.
