125 Interesting Tidbits about SG

1. St. George’s School didn’t start on the Hilltop. The first two locations were in Newport: Armistead Cottage on Hunter Avenue, from 1896 to1897, and Swann Villa (pictured below) on Seaview Avenue, from 1897 to 1901. In 1901, the school moved to its treasured home on Purgatory Road in Middletown.

2. From dirt to pavement and horse and buggy to automobile, the Main Drive has welcomed the St. George’s community with the same view of Old School for decades.

3. Every Dragon knows it can get awfully cold and windy on the Hilltop, but perhaps the classes of 1982, 1983, 1984, and 1985 know best. The lowest temperature ever recorded in Newport was -9°F/-22°C in January 1982. 4. The cornerstone of Memorial Schoolhouse holds a time capsule filled with copies of the School Charter and Bylaws, the School Catalog, a copy of the Dragon, Alumni Bulletin, the Lance, and “St. George’s School in the War,” which profiles each of the 16 members of the community who died in World War I. Also inside are coins of the day, a local newspaper, and photographs of the school, sixth-formers, and athletic teams.

5. Author and poet Maya Angelou gave a 75-minute talk on spirituality, weaving in tales from her past and the family members who influenced her, to roughly 1,700 people in attendance at the Dorrance Field House as a part of St. George’s Centennial celebration in 1996.

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6. During the school’s opening year, 11 students were enrolled — six boarding and five day students.

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7. A standing portrait of St. George, which originally hung above the fireplace in the center hall after Old School was built, mysteriously disappeared from campus. It was last seen photographed in 1965. Memories of the portrait, or any information regarding its disappearance, may be sent to archives@stgeorges.edu.

8. The Sixth-Form Shield was originally sewn into the fabric of blazer pockets. Only members of the sixth form could purchase this blazer, and it was worn throughout a student’s sixth-form year. Still offered in the Campus Store, pin-on shield patches are now worn by sixth-formers on Prize Day only. 9. The school motto, “Sapentia Utriusque Vitæ Lumen,” is inscribed on the exterior of King Hall and translates to, “Wisdom, the light of every life.” It was suggested in 1900 by William Binney, friend and benefactor of SG, and incorporated into the construction of King Hall, which was completed in 1907.

10. More than 1,200 apple pies have been awarded to SG community members since the annual Pie Race first began in 1959 as a means of celebrating school spirit. And speaking of apples … Anecdotal evidence tells us that King Hall’s famous apple crisp, served throughout the decades, is one of students’ most beloved dishes. 11. For the Centennial celebration, in 1996, the Boston Pops Esplanade Orchestra played under a big top tent on Crocker Field. The famed composer John Williams, who has created some of the most popular film scores in cinematic history, was conducted. Williams turned 90 in February 2022.

12. Views of our extraordinary Hilltop that we all know and love have also caught the eyes of Hollywood. Parts of “The Education of Charlie Banks,” directed by Fred Durst, were filmed on campus, with establishing shots of Old School, King Hall, and the Chapel used to represent Vassar College. The film premiered at the 2007 Tribeca Film Festival, in New York.

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13. Faculty pets have always been a part of school life. This photo appeared on SG social media with the post, “Having a ‘ruff’ time with calculus.” (Photo of Gus, teachers Warren and Holly Williams’ dog.)

14. Three Hilltop buildings are listed on the National Register of Historic Places: the Gothic Revival–style Church of St. George (1924-1928), the Tudor Revival–style Memorial Schoolhouse (1921-1923), and the Little Chapel (1909-1911).

15. The first graduate to be hired as a member of the faculty was Harold N. Arrowsmith, Class of 1904. Following his graduation from Harvard, he taught German and French at SG from 1909 to 1912. 16. John Nicholas Brown ordered lighting manufacturer Edward F. Caldwell & Co. to create 10 replicas of a chandelier he admired in a church in Spain in January 1927. With the help of generous donors, these elaborate crystal fixtures were fully restored between 2011 and 2013.

17. Professor Philip Drinker, Class of 1911 and inventor of the iron lung, brought one to campus for a talk in 1950 and let students get inside of it. 18. Wheeler Close, the enclosed garden next to the Chapel cloisters, was named in memory of Alan R. Wheeler, a faculty member from 1902 to 1947 and an avid gardener.

19. Students of many eras fondly remember the school’s holiday traditions. The Christmas Festival started with a feast in King Hall in December 1912; the Service of Nine Lessons and Carols in the Chapel were first held in December 1958.

20. A dramatic Dragon win in athletics has always been a reason to celebrate. Left: Former coach and school chaplain the Rt. Rev. Dr. Hays Rockwell reacts to a 1963 wrestling victory. Right: Coach Dwayne Pina celebrates in style following an overtime basketball win over Pomfret in 2020.

21. The library has had several homes. From its original spot in Old School Main Common Room (which doubled as the school’s dining room until 1907), the library moved to Sixth-Form House in 1934 and was named in memory of Washington Everardus Bogardus, Class of 1915. In 1968, the library moved to what is now the Brown Center and was renamed in memory of Nathaniel P. Hill, Class of 1915. In 1978, a new library was built, keeping the Hill name, on the former site of the Applied Mechanics Building. The library was fully renovated in 2011.

23. Memorial Schoolhouse and the Chapel are attached physically to reinforce one of the school's founding principles: that the spiritual life, and a commitment to serve others, be recognized as intimately connected to and essential to the attainment of true knowledge.

24. One of the ways students “served marks” in 1910 was by weeding dandelions from the lawns in front of Old School.

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22. Carved lists of graduates on the wooden wall panels in King Hall started in 1923; the school backfilled earlier years.

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c.1949 Ruth Davenport, First Librarian, at Desk

Ruth Davenport worked at St. George's from 1947-1964 and was the school’s first librarian. At the time, the library was housed in the space now occupied by the Advancement Office on the main floor of Sixth-Form House.

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In 2000, the White House Historical Association published a commemorative calendar for the 200th anniversary of the White House. The 14 images for the calendar were painted by 14 artists, one artist from each of the original 13 colonies and the District of Columbia. Chosen from Rhode Island was former St. George’s Art Department Chair Richard Grosvenor. His painting, “Crisp October,” shows the columned south balcony facade of the White House.

26. In the early days on the Hilltop, students arrived in Newport by ferry from New York, and by train from Providence and Fall River. From there, they would be taken by horse-drawn carriage to the front door of Old School. 27. After Memorial Schoolhouse was built, the old Schoolroom building (once connected to Sixth-Form House) was torn down and its materials were used to build a boathouse for the school on Third Beach.

28. In recent “exit polls” prior to graduation, when students were asked which song will most remind them of St. George’s in the future, the prevailing answer was the hymn “Jerusalem,” sung in chapel a few times during the year — and always at Prize Day Chapel. 29. Two historic buildings on campus are topped with cupolas and gleaming goldtoned weathervanes: Memorial Schoolhouse and Diman Dormitory. The schoolhouse weathervane depicts St. George and the dragon; the one on Diman is a decorative arrow (though some say it resembles a fish skeleton).

31. There used to be only two phones on campus for students to use, and a “telephone boy” would deliver messages as part of a student messenger service.

30. Rich with culture, dining, and entertainment, the nearby city of Newport has always been a draw during time off from school responsibilities. Early on in school history, students who went into Newport for an afternoon had to wear a jacket and tie.

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32. A “temporary” altar window remained in the Chapel for more than 80 years before a true leaded stained-glass window was designed by artist Lyn Hovey and installed in 2010. The temporary window was simply painted glass - a quick solution to have something in place for the Chapel Consecration in 1928.

33. To create the St. George’s shield logo, the school commissioned Pierre la Rose, a Harvard instructor in medieval heraldry and talented artist. La Rose began with the St. George’s cross, adding black diamonds to the white background as a visual pun on the last name of founder John Diman. The design dates back to 1938-1939.

34. The Red Key Society started out as a welcoming committee of team captains for guests on campus (such as visiting teams and their families). Red Key guides now give tours to prospective families for the Admission Office.

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35. The official red of St. George’s is Pantone 1797.

36. The largest event ever held on the Hilltop was the Centennial celebration, in 1996. More than 2,300 were in attendance. 37. The first student to graduate did so on his own — a class size of one — in June 1899. His name was Cornelius S. Lee; records show he was admitted to the New York Stock Exchange on Sept. 6, 1906.

38. When Memorial Schoolhouse was built in the early 1920s, the St. George’s School Railroad ran in the sub-basement, delivering coal to Old School, Sixth-Form House, and Auchincloss through tunnels connecting the buildings.

39. There have been several sports teams to come and go on the Hilltop, including gymnastics, rowing, wrestling, and cycling. Volleyball was added as a team sport and began competition in the Independent School League in 2021.

40. The Chapel Choir once used the Crypt under the Chapel as its choir room. 41. The faculty residence know as The Cottage was moved across Kane Avenue in 1924 to make way for construction of the Behrend Pool.

42. The porch on the east side of Old School became "Sixth-Form Porch" because it was a popular gathering place for seniors before meals.

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Old School is the first building constructed specifically for St. George’s School, dating back to 1901. The architects were John Diman’s cousin, Prescott O. Clarke, and Wallis Howe, members of the Providence firm Clarke, Spaulding & Howe.

44. The school’s first official rival was not Middlesex, but actually Cloyne School, formerly located in Newport, Rhode Island. Although the school no longer exists, it was located outside Gate No. 1 of the Newport Naval Station, and most of the original school buildings are still in place today — now owned by the Navy. 45. The first Middlesex rivalry game was held at SG in the fall of 1902; SG football won 28-0.

46. The first St. George’s Sports Hall of Fame induction ceremony took place in November 1995. Honored were inaugural inductees Alfred L. Dyer ’86, Marie Dougherty Hinman ’75, Elizabeth Hunt Isaacson ’83, Henry W. Large Jr. ’58, Robert A. Shann ’61, John H. Stein ’50, John F. Watson ’53, and William A. Wilson ’37 — and coaches William P. Elliot, Jeremiah Ford II, and George W. Wheeler ’27.

47. The prefect system was instituted in 1908 by John Byron Diman. Each year since then, a senior prefect has been elected to lead the student body and be a liaison between the students, head of school, and faculty. The first senior prefect was Laurance David Redway, Class of 1908. He went on to receive his bachelor’s degree at Harvard in 1912 and his M.D. from Harvard in 1916.

48. Three faculty members in school history have been appointed head of school: Stephen Cabot (1917-1926), Russell Nevins (1926-1928), and William Buell ’14 (1951-1961).

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49. Students at St. George’s get to surf before class. In fact, upon the initiative of students in 2018-19, the Surf & Leadership Program became an official afternoon activity. In 2021, members of the group volunteered at a Third Beach clinic aimed at helping disabled veterans enjoy getting out on the waves.

50. Jane Stormont-Lewis was the first female faculty member, serving from 1899 to 1900. She taught German and French at the school’s second location, Swann Villa.

51. A horse was once placed inside the Headmaster’s Office as a prank. 53. One of the first Japanese children born on the East Coast attended St. George’s. Yoneo Arai, born to Japanese citizens Ryichir Arai and Tazu Ushiba, graduated in 1908 and went on to Harvard, where his friends included Vincent Astor ’10, Sinclair Weeks, and T.S. Eliot.

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Before AirPods and smartphones, students could go to the Radio-Victrola room in lower Diman Hall to listen to a football game or their favorite dance orchestra, or play records from the school’s collection. 54. When King Hall was built in 1907, a temporary covered wooden walkway was installed between Old School and the dining hall. The following year, in 1908, fully enclosed cloisters were constructed, which we now call the Wind Tunnel. 55. During World War II, the Chapel tower was used as an official military observation post, manned 24 hours a day by students, faculty, faculty families, and neighbors. At the time, the top of the tower, which stands 145 feet tall, was the highest point on Aquidneck Island.

56. The first Prize Day held outside was in 1971, when several sixth-form students persuaded the administration to “capitalize on the natural beauty of the school’s location,” according to the Spring/Summer 1971 edition of the SG Bulletin.

57. Fifteen alumni and one faculty member died in the service during WWI and are the reason the Memorial Schoolhouse received its name. They are listed on oak panels above the fireplace in the schoolhouse lobby, Memorial Hall.

58. The school handbook, The Shield, was first published in 1946, 50 years after the school was formed.

59. The first Prize Day was held in June 1903. On that day, just three prizes were awarded — Academic, Athletic, and Gardening. John B. Diman was eager to have people donate more prizes to recognize the efforts of a greater number of students. 60. St. George’s Day is most often celebrated each year on April 23, though some religious traditions delay celebrations if April 23 falls before Easter. We use the day to celebrate Dragon Pride.

61. There are several spaces on the east side of the Academic Center meant to be used as outdoor classrooms. 63. When organized athletic competitions first began, the baseball and football teams were allowed to have faculty members on their rosters.

64. The first winner of the Distinguished Alumnus Award was John Nicholas Brown ’18, in 1977, and the second was U.S. Senator Claiborne de B. Pell ’36, in 1978. The award was not granted again until 1991, at the urging of honorary board member Lewis Madeira ’39. At that time, the award was renamed The John B. Diman Award. The first female to receive the award, the school’s highest alumni honor, was the Rev. Susan E. Lyon ’75, in 1997.

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62. The Geronimo program’s first summer sail was in 1974, and the first academic-year trips started in the fall of 1975.

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65. In 1987, for the first time in school history, more girls (42) graduated than boys (40).

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66. A school dance, scheduled for Feb. 23, 1935, had to be postponed due to an epidemic of the measles. 67. The Winter Formal began in the 1890s, with girls visiting from as far as New York and

Philadelphia. These dances were so well received that they evolved into elaborately planned extravaganzas. Today, the Winter Formal remains a much-anticipated student event.

68. Little Chapel was the first chapel on the Hilltop; it was moved to its current location when the 100-foot-long, 29-footwide Chapel we know today was constructed. 69. School on the Hilltop was originally first through sixth form (grades 7-12). First form was eliminated in 1930; second form ended in 1966.

70. In January 1971, Mary Walsh, a day student from Newport, was the first girl to officially enroll at St. George’s. A sixth-former, she completed a high school English credit on the Hilltop and was honored at Prize Day. (She received her diploma from her previous school in Noroton, Connecticut.)

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71. Alixe Callen became the school’s 12th and first female head of school on July 1, 2017.

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72. Alumni Weekend is a time for past students to return to the Hilltop, to reunite with each other and with the school. The first of such celebrations was on May 19, 1917, and was originally called “Alumni Day.” 73. Once a regular gathering in the Study Hall of Memorial Schoolhouse, Assembly was moved to Madeira Hall because of more-stringent state fire codes enacted following the Station nightclub fire in West Warwick in 2003. Eccles Merrick Diman Cabot Nevins 74. When the School Battalion existed during World War I, Prize Day always included a military demonstration. 75. All five past and present headmasters at the time were in attendance for the 50th Anniversary Celebration of St. George’s, in 1946. 76. The first female Senior Prefect was Addie Dix, Class of 1976, four years after the school went fully coed.

77. A baseball player and football player are carved in stone over the north slype door of the Chapel. Documentation says they are Babe Ruth and Red Grange, though many think the baseball player bears an 77 uncanny resemblance to Lou Gehrig. 78. The dragon sculptures now adorning the exterior of the Nathaniel P. Hill Library once decorated flagpoles on the Manufacturers Building at 101 Sabin Street in Providence, which was demolished in 1964. Salvaged by two separate collectors in Massachusetts and Rhode Island, they were eventually gifted to the school. 79. The only midterm graduation to ever occur on the Hilltop was during World War II. In January 1945, three already-enlisted sixth-formers were graduated in a special ceremony held in the Chapel. 80. The @DragonsofSG Instagram account reached 1,000 followers on Sept. 10, 2015.

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81. A campuswide “dimout” was observed for almost two years during World War II, preventing buildings from being fully lit at night.

82. The stone gates at the entrance onto Main Drive are a memorial to Mr. Julien T. Davies, a longtime trustee, benefactor, and loyal friend who sold his summer home, Pinecroft, on Purgatory Road, to the school (for a generously discounted price). The residence became a faculty home and dormitory in 1913. It was demolished in 1965.

83. Prior to the 1980s, students mostly carried their textbooks and school supplies by hand. Not so anymore. Backpack piles are now visible around campus daily, particularly when the school community gathers for chapel and Assembly. 84. The school’s first Black student was Conrad Young, in 1963. The Conrad Young Prize is now awarded on Prize Day “to a member of the fifth form who has contributed significantly to the school’s efforts to become a more diverse, respectful community through scholarship, leadership, and character.”

85. According to the Admission Office, students’ smiles are the school’s best advertisement.

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86. The Snapdragons were the first a cappella group formed in the 21st century, beginning in 2002. They were named in honor of a female a cappella group that previously existed at St. George’s. Two years later, the Hilltoppers, a male a cappella group, was formed.

87. The first two squash courts on campus were located to the north of Sixth-Form House. They were donated by the mother of John Nicholas Brown, Class of 1918 and donor of the Chapel, in 1913. They had to be torn down for the construction of Memorial Schoolhouse. 88. Prize Day took place live online on May 25, 2020, for the first time in school history.

89. Before the Hoyt Pool, the Behrend Pool was located between Eccles and Auchincloss dormitories. The Behrend Pool was named in memory of benefactors Ernst and Mary Behrend, parents of Warren Moritz Behrend, Class of 1928. The younger Behrend died heroically in a car accident in which he swerved to avoid a bus filled with schoolchildren that had cut in front of his vehicle. He was just 20. 90. Although John Diman insisted that students keep academics as their first priority, he recognized the value that athletics might have for his small school. Thus, he formed two school clubs — Sachuest and Sakonnet — to inspire competitive spirit, to give everyone a chance to play and practice, and to allow students to get to know each other across class years. The club teams were most active from 1904 to 1931, but were resurrected in 2008. Students today are still assigned to one or the other, and “club games” take place sporadically in Assembly.

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91. Students cited two reasons for their excitement over the renovation of Dragon Quad in 1995: The dense shrubs that once surrounded the dragon sculpture were removed, making it easier to bolt through the Quad in a straight line, and the addition of benches, which they said prevented teachers from saying “There’s no place to sit” when asked to hold class outdoors.

92. On March 17, 2020, in a letter from Head of School Alixe Callen, it was announced that due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, students would not return to campus from Spring Break. SG would transition to virtual learning, with students attending classes remotely from their homes, for the first time in school history. 93. A time capsule was buried under a paver in the Buell/Wheeler courtyard in 1996, the school’s centennial year. At the time, it was requested that the capsule be excavated at the school’s 125th anniversary celebration.

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94. The Rev. Jackie Kirby became the school’s 19th, and first female chaplain in the 2017-18 academic year.

95. In the years before the duPont Science Building was constructed, in 1963, science classes were held in Memorial Schoolhouse, with experiments sometimes performed in the Study Hall.

96. The St. George’s Archives has been in operation for 21 years. It was founded by Jack Doll ’52 and is now overseen by current archivist Valerie Simpson.

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97. The Blizzard of ’78 brought 20 inches of snow to the Hilltop on Feb. 7, 1978.

98. The National Weather Service reports 21 inches of snow fell on Jan. 29, 2022, in Newport. Head of School Alixe Callen gave students a much-appreciated snow day, with no classes (not even virtual!).

99. The Polar Bears Club used to practice ice rescue drills and climb the side of the Chapel as part of a wide range of fitness and survival training. The program started as “the Adventure Group” and was created by science teacher Gil Burnett, who was a former U.S. Intelligence Agency officer.

100. Class rings became popular at St. George’s in the 1950s. 101. Service to the greater community has long been part of a St. George’s education.

102. The Cabot-Harman Ice Center is named in honor of two past headmasters: Steven Cabot (1917-1926) and Archer Harman (1961-1972, 1988-1989). Both played and loved ice hockey. It evolved from the original, uncovered Cabot Memorial Ice Hockey Rink built in 1954, which was covered in 1968. Before 1954, hockey was played on Nelson’s Pond.

103. The fully student-written play “Behind the Hills” premiered in Madeira Hall on April 30, 2015. Created by Catherine Farmer ’15 and Laurie Germain ’15, who met at age 10 while living in Rwanda, the play told the story of the Rwandan genocide of 1994.

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104. The tradition of the Diman Cup — awarded to the winner of the most athletic competitions between the St. George’s Dragons and the Portsmouth Abbey Ravens each year — started in 1979. That was more than 83 years after the founding of St. George’s School and 53 years after Portsmouth Abbey, which both owe their beginnings to John Diman.

105. Every stone used in the Chapel’s construction was cut, carved, and transported to the Hilltop from the J.P. Falt Co. Stone Mill in Sander’s Quarry, Indiana.

106. The attention-grabbing dragon mascot seen at games and special events today has a wingspan of 6 feet. 107. The words to the School Hymn were written in 1905 by Louise Diman, one of John Byron Diman’s sisters.

108. Emily Diman, John Diman’s other sister, served the school long past our founder’s departure in 1917. She worked on the Hilltop until 1928.

109. The Lance started out as a biennial publication in 1908. No editions were published in 1909 or 1911. By 1912 it had become an annual publication.

110. The Dragon is the oldest student publication. It started as a monthly in March 1899, and in the earliest years it reported on SG news and events in addition to publishing student essays, fiction, poetry, and drawings. 111. The Red & White had precursors (e.g., St. George’s Weekly). It ceased publication from 1912 to 1922, but the school newspaper has consistently remained in production since 1922.

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112. Nellie Brown, a talented cook, was one of John Diman’s first hires, in 1896. She stayed for 37 years.

113. The longest-serving SG employee in school history was Samuel Ross Jr., a staff member from 1906 until 1966.

114. Prior to 1907, there was a chicken yard on Cliff Field that supplied all of the eggs for meals. Community members advocated for it to be moved to the north side of the kitchen to improve the view from the windows of the newly built King Hall.

115. The whimsical cartoons of school life seen in early editions of The Dragon were mostly done by Jacob Bates Abbott, Class of 1913, who went on to draw for The Lampoon at Harvard. 116. Typically, The Lance yearbook is dedicated by the students to a faculty member; however, the honor has gone to at least two staff members:

The Class of 1970 dedicated their edition to Theo

Belcher, who worked at the school for 48 years and was affectionately known as “the keeper of the keys,” overseeing the school’s buildings. The Class of 1991 dedicated their yearbook to Bessie Burns, a dining hall worker who retired in the 1980s but who remained living on campus for years. She was known for sipping a cup of tea in the afternoons and regaling her coworkers with poems and stories, recited from memory, from her life in Ireland. Students loved to greet her as they came through the food line, and she loved their company. 117. Maggie’s Pantry, adjacent to the Main Common Room in Old School, is named in honor of Margaret Galvin, who worked at St. George’s from 1910 to 1961 performing such tasks as cooking and preparing tea but perhaps more memorably serving as a warm and motherly figure to students over the decades. A native of County Kerry, Ireland, and an avid sports fan, she kept in the pantry photos of student-athletes in their moments of glory.

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<< Sloan Buhse ’15 giving her Chapel Talk.

118. When the school infirmary opened in 1931, it included a dental office.

119. In 1945, the theater department presented “A Christmas Carol” at the Elizabeth Peabody House, in Boston, one of the first settlement houses in the city and also founded in 1896.

120. The maze on the floor of the Chapel was designed by donor John Nicholas Brown, Class of 1918, and represents the difficulties of reaching eternal life.

121. The first turf fields were installed in 2018, one replacing the formerly grass Crocker Field, and the other, Montgomery Field, newly named in honor of former coach Archibald Montgomery, as a gift of the 1990 boys’ lacrosse team.

122. Each year, sixthformers may volunteer to give a Chapel Talk. These days, approximately one-quarter of all seniors decide to do so. 123. Around the top of the Chapel’s turret tower are four separate busts. They are: John Nicholas Brown, Class of 1918 and Chapel donor; the Rev. Arthur Newton Peaslee, a math teacher at SG and Brown’s favorite teacher; Stephen Cabot, the headmaster during the first two years of construction of the Chapel; and Russell Nevins, the headmaster during the last two years of construction and at the time of the consecration service. Each one is guarded by six grotesques, meant to scare away bad demons.

124. SG was once home to a nine-hole golf course and a barber shop in the basement of Memorial Schoolhouse — and a rifle range under King Hall.

125. More than 1,200 students applied to St. George’s in 2021-22 — more than any in our history — for roughly 90 spots. St. George’s is well positioned to flourish and prosper for another 125 years!

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Alumni News

Rob Baer ’00 and his wife Lynne are the proud co-founders and owners of a new boutique hotel and hostel that opened in November 2021 called The PAD in Silverthorne, Colorado. Sustainably constructed from 18 shipping containers, the design-forward hotel features 36 rooms offering a variety of options for different budgets — ranging from dorm-style bunk rooms to private and posh suites. Years in development, according to Lynne, the project has been highlighted in a number of publications, including the Boston Globe, Travel & Leisure, and Forbes.

The CLASS NOTES section has been removed from this digital copy of the Bulletin to respect our alums’ privacy.

Class notes are only available in the print edition.

My middle school metamorphosis

Throughout grade school, I wore a uniform that consisted of khaki pants and a white polo shirt. Each morning I arrived clean and pressed, but by dismissal, I looked like I had signed up to be the canvas for a Jackson Pollock painting — but one where, instead of paint, he used markers, ketchup, and grass stains. One day my principal stopped me on my way out the door and asked what had happened to me. I paused for a moment and proceeded to say, “Tough day at the office, Mr. Nespole.” I am not sure how a 6-year-old me knew such a phrase, but it certainly shocked my principal, who burst out laughing.

This story epitomizes my journey throughout elementary and middle school. I was always quick with a retort, but it was all an act. Deep down, I felt like a distorted cacophony of ideas trapped by the speckled white cement halls that confined me. Instead of focusing on schoolwork, I put all my energy into gags, pranks, and any other mechanism for entertaining my classmates, but my mischievous nature was simply a means to an end.

It was apparent to me that reading came much easier to everyone else in my class. I was falling behind and, as a result, felt like I was dumb. Surprisingly, I found that the best way to hide my academic insufficiency was to place myself at the center of attention. Distracting my classmates with humor was the perfect way to disguise my insecurity. To avoid being a class idiot, I became the class clown. Then, in sixth grade, I met my match.

Mr. Smee was a tall, steely-eyed man, with the courage of an eagle and cunning of a fox. He and I faced off like two cowboys in a Clint Eastwood spaghetti western. Yet what set him apart was not his intimidating stature or powerful nature, but his ability to empathize. He assigned a project on ancient Greece that required many weeks of research, but naturally I left it to the last day and failed. I remember sitting in my classroom as he handed everyone’s projects back except mine. One by one, my classmates received their grades and filed out of the room. Mr. Smee then sat down beside me and through his thoughtful questioning of what went wrong, I eventually broke. I pressed my face against the cold steel desk and wept.

That day, Mr. Smee did something that no other teacher had. Instead of getting mad at me for my usual antics, he found the natural leader in me before I ever could. He helped me see that my issue wasn’t a lack of intelligence, but instead my misguided belief that I was dumb. He challenged me to focus my energy on leading rather than distracting my peers. This moment was a major turning point in my life. Through hard work and determination, I started to achieve good grades and discovered that I could balance making my friends laugh while also thriving in the classroom. It is hard to imagine that any of my classmates and teachers who elected me Senior Prefect would recognize me in my messy white polo shirt (unless of course, they spot me in the dining hall on rib Thursday). While I may still ruin a shirt every once in a while, I have come a long way from the bowl-cutsporting menace I was as a child. I no longer hide in the center of attention but instead take command of it and use the spotlight to further class discussions. I am no longer the class idiot, and while I can still be the class clown when appropriate, I have learned how to use what got me in trouble in middle school to instead lead my peers to succeed. Thanks to Mr. Smee, that’s my story: class idiot to class clown to class president. 

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