Ipswich Female Seminary opened in April, 1828 in Ipswich Massachusetts. Zilpah P. Grant (later Banister) was the first principal and Mary Lyon was her assistant. It was dedicated to training girls to become teachers and missionaries; students did practice teaching under the guidance of a teacher. The average enrollment was 116 students per term. The course of study included English, arithmetic, geography, chemistry, human physiology, history, the natural sciences, religion, vocal music, and calisthenics. The Seminary sent eighty-eight teachers to the western and southern states to work as educational missionaries. The school closed in 1839 due to Grant's retirement and reopened in 1844 under the supervision of graduate Eunice Caldwell Cowles and her husband, the Reverend John P. Cowles. It closed permanently in 1876 because of the increasing number of public schools.