Holderness School Peter Barnum and his dog, Barley.
BARNUM AND BARLEY Admissions and Advancement icon Peter Barnum retires after 40 years at Holderness
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f Peter Barnum had a spirit animal, it would probably be a yellow lab.
During his 25 years as Holderness School’s director of admissions, Peter would show up to work most days with one of his scruffy yellow labs by his side. His first lab, Willy, was such a creature of habit that on the days Peter was away on business, Willy would pad over from his nearby home, through the woods, to the admissions office. “Carolyn Henderson, who I worked with early on, would take care of him during the day and then when she left to go home she would put Willy in the car and drive him home and pass him off to my wife, Joanie,” Peter says with a chuckle. “I think he literally thought he had to be here.”
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That workaholic canine quickly became a fixture in the admissions office, and his joyful, bumbling presence— and that of subsequent dogs—calmed generations of prospective students. “They’d walk in the door and see a knuckleheaded lab lying on the f loor and just feel the pressure either dissipate or disappear,” Peter says. We’re sitting in Peter’s office on a golden October afternoon, talking about his upcoming retirement this June. As Peter reminisces about his 40 years at Holderness, another yellow lab, Barley, sits by his side. The spirited puppy has been a fixture on campus this fall, livening up the Advancement office where Peter has worked since 2005 as senior associate director for major gifts. In a way, Barley and his furry predecessors
