Josiah Holbrook (1788-1854)

Near this spot, scientist, educator, and founder of the American Lyceum movement Josiah Holbrook accidentally fell to his death while studying rocks and minerals along the bluffs of Blackwater Creek during a research trip through Virginia. Holbrook, a Connecticut native and graduate of Yale, was nationally known for popularizing lyceums, local associations that formed across the U.S. to sponsor lectures and debates. To make science understandable to children, he invented and manufactured scientific teaching aids for use in schools and wrote educational articles. Holbrook was buried in Lynchburg’s Old City Cemetery, where admiring citizens placed a marble headstone at his grave.