The first student literary society at Baltimore City College was called the Peabody Lyceum. The group held its first meeting on October 4, 1859 under the direction of Professor Lovejoy. Meetings were conducted using parliamentary procedure with members being fined for poor decorum. Admission to the society was based on an individuals ranking in his class. The society would request the names of the top performing students and then invite those students to appear before the body. After a student's appearance before the society, admission would be debated and if the student garnered a 2/3 vote, the individual would be granted membership to the Peabody Lyceum. Members were selected to perform declamations or to debate one another. The society continued for nearly a decade until June 11, 1869, when with tensions in the group mounting over the removal of one of its members, the president of the society moved to adjourn "sine die". A second literary society formed several years later, calling itself the Sheppard Society, but it dissolved shortly before the creation of the Bancroft Society.