The
Avon Record Volume XCVII Issue 1
Andrés Calderón Suárez ’27
The Student Newspaper of Avon Old Farms School
Friday, October 20, 2023
Roberto Clemente Jr. Visits Campus
Staff Writer
On October 6th, Roberto Clemente Jr. spoke to the Avon Old Farms community in Brown Auditorium about his influential father, Roberto Clemente, who was a Hall of Fame baseball player. “He was a wonderful human being, who also happened to play baseball,” Clemente Jr. mentioned, emphasizing that his father’s success went beyond the baseball field. Playing for the Pittsburgh Pirates, Clemente Sr. became the first Latin American and eleventh baseball player in Major League Baseball history to achieve 3,000 career hits. Unfortunately, his 3,000th hit was also his last. On December 31, 1972, an earthquake hit Nicaragua, and Clemente Sr. boarded a plane to ensure aid was delivered to the victims. Tragically, the plane
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Clemente Jr. spoke about his father’s charitable work during his baseball career. In this photo, he poses with Mr. Cantrell.
crashed, and he died at thirty-eight years old. Now, his legacy lives on through his son. Clemente Jr. remembers his father as a man keen on helping others and
as an inspiration for countless people. During his talk, Clemente Jr. mentioned his brief career in professional baseball, playing for
the Philadelphia Phillies, the San Diego Padres, and Baltimore Orioles. After suffering a career-ending injury, Clemente became the voice of the New York
Yankees, as well as a commentator on ESPN. Simply by carrying his father’s name, Clemente Jr. has had the chance to meet various presidents and world-class athletes. Through his stories about conversations with Michael Jordan and Barack Obama, he emphasized a powerful message: people will remember those who do good in the world. Clemente Jr. explained that everyone has a unique fingerprint. Depending on what people do and how they treat each other, everyone can either leave a good or bad mark with their fingers, and people are responsible for the fingerprints they make. Following the speech at Brown Auditorium, Clemente Jr. and his wife met with students and members of the AOF community; they shared more personal stories and reminded the AOF students that they should always strive to make this world a better place.
Phamily Phun: Pheasant Hunts on Phamily Weekend Dominik Sedlak-Braude ’25 Staff Writer
It was Family Weekend in the Autumn of 1997. The air was crisp, with colorful leaves gently falling to the ground on the Avon Old Farms campus. The anticipation grew as parents gathered at the starting line in the woods, eager for the contest to begin. A deafening gunshot shattered the silence—a father taking aim at a pheasant—and so the hunt began. The Pheasant Hunt tradition began soon after Avon Old Farms reopened in 1948, having served as a refuge for blind veterans for the previous four years. Traditionally, it was held on the Saturday of Family Weekend. The hunt was open to all students and their family members.
A week prior to the event, the Nimrod Club would create a marked trail between trees in the woods. During the hunt, students would hide behind trees throughout the trail and spin cages with pheasants bought by faculty the day before. As families approached, the students would release the confused and dizzy pheasants in the direction of the hunters. There was no prize for hunting the most pheasants, the hunt was simply meant to be an amusing time for families to bond. No injuries ever occurred during the Pheasant Hunt on Family Weekend, but in 1998 the then Head of School Mr. LaRocque along with Mr. Rice and Mr. Crocker decided that the hunt was too dangerous, so they discontinued the tradition.
Members of the 1956 Nimrod Club gather before a club hunting trip.
Author’s note: I would like to thank Mr. Custer and Mr. Rice, for spending their time retelling the tales of the Pheasant Hunt.
Not only did I learn about pheasant hunting, but I learned a great deal about their time here so far and the history of Avon Old Farms.
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Mr. Rice and Mr. Custer both have incredibly unique stories that I look forward to sharing in future editions of The Avon Record.
On the Inside...
2
Hypnotist Imbus entrances campus yet again
5
Halloween Season Special
7
Student-Athletes Attend First-ever Founders Summit