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Fairhope Public Library

Lydia J. Newcomb Comings

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Samuel and Lydia J. Newcomb Comings arrived in Fairhope in 1901. The couple were proponents of Organic Education or the advancement of the mind, body, and spirit of the child. Ms. Comings was an early adopter of physical education. In fact, she majored in it, taught it in Chicago Public Schools, and published books about it before settling in Fairhope. She and her husband started the Organic School of Education and convinced the pioneer educator Marietta Johnson to join them in the Fairhope Experiment. Lydia served as librarian for only four years (1917-1921), but her service on the library board and involvement in club activity spanned nearly four decades. Comings also published the first comprehensive history of Baldwin County, with aide of her assistant Martha Albers. A Brief History of Baldwin County was published in 1928, and praised by Alabama's State Archivist at the time Peter A. Brannon, who wrote the Foreward.