Mermaid Club (Germantown, Pa.)

The Mermaid Club was organized in 1887 as an extension of the "Band of St. Michael," a social group for boys founded by Ms. Agnes Lambdin and affiliated with St. Michael's Church of Germantown. Young men who attained the age of 19 were no longer eligible for membership in the Band. The decision to establish the Mermaid Club stemmed from a desire to provide the young men who lacked the means to pursue further formal education with an opportunity to read and discuss great books as a way to engender intellectual stimulation and enlightenment. At its founding, the average age of the club members was 16. The name of the club has its root in the Mermaid Tavern which, as legend has it, served as a meeting place for the literary elite of the Elizabethan Era, including such figures as Sir Walter Raleigh and John Donne among others. The club motto, Ventilare Scintillam, translates to "Kindle the Spark."

During its existence, the Mermaid Club held debates, sponsored a series of public events that included a course of 6 lectures on the topic of Russian literature and history, presented by Nathan Haskell Dole, considered a pre-eminent scholar of Russian literature at the time and collected their own writings into a yearly publication called "The Mermaid Inn."

In 1894, members of the Mermaid Club lobbied extensively to have a branch of the newly established free library located in Germantown. In 1895, their efforts came to fruition and the Germantown branch opened in Vernon Hall at Chelten and Germantown Avenues--that branch is now known as the Joseph E. Coleman Regional Library.