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Love Stories
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LOVE STORIES
LOVE AT PEDDIE CAN HAPPEN IN BIG WAYS AND SM ALL WAYS, gradually and all at once, with planning and without. Sometimes, it can even happen during Algebra II. We’re just thrilled to know Peddie had a hand in it. Here are the stories of six couples who nurtured the seeds of friendship, guidance and support that were planted at Peddie — and let them bloom.
JALEH AMOUZEGAR ’85
& CHRISTOPHER ACITO ’85
Jaleh: Chris and I sat with one person between us in chapel and community meeting for four years; we started dating at the end of senior year. We barely spoke until we were both peer leaders during our senior year. We became friendly and in the spring managed to gather three classmates and convince our parents to let us take a trip to Florida for spring break. After the trip, we spent a lot of time together. I was secretly hoping he would ask me to prom; two of my close friends were hoping to go with him too! He asked me to prom, and we began dating immediately. We became serious very quickly. We dated all through college, managing a four-hour distance between our two schools.
We took one year off in graduate school and reunited at age 25, when we became engaged. I can honestly say that this relationship was the best thing that ever happened to me! Peddie helped solidify our relationship because we share many friends and memories, and we essentially grew up together.
From left: Peddie graduates Jaleh Amouzegar ’85 and Christopher Acito ’85 celebrate at their May 1985 commencement ceremony.
KIMBERLEY (THOMPSON) NIXON ’00 & CHRISTOPHER NIXON ’00
Kim: We met on campus freshman year. We had the same friend circle, and we ran track together. I always had a crush on him, but it took a lot of effort on my part (me asking Chris for gum in chemistry class, or asking him to hold my blocks during track practice) for Chris to realize he liked me too! We went to prom junior year, and the rest is history.
In high school, you’re experiencing your highest highs and your lowest lows, with full-on teenage angst. We experienced all of those things together, and that really cemented us early on — being elected student body president (Kim), breaking sprint records (Chris), not getting into your first choice for college, the occasional disappointing test result, and pulling a hamstring (both!) — we did all those things together.
Our large group of Peddie friends still reflect back on the good ol’ days: Blair Day, bonfires, pizza on Main Street. Chris spent a lot of time with me and my friends in the Masters lounge. I spent a lot of time trying to impress his mom when she was volunteering on campus … and we took a lot of ribbing from friends for both. But we wouldn’t change anything, not a thing.
Christopher Nixon ’00 and Kimberley Nixon ’00 pose for a prom photo in May 1999.
T.J. MCCARTHY ’99 & LY-LAN (WISLER) MCCARTHY ’99
T.J.: Ly-Lan transferred to Peddie at the start of our junior year. We briefly met on the first day of school during lunch, but our “romance” began to take shape during Mr. Browne’s Algebra II class. And just like in a John Hughes film, Ly-Lan was the studious one in the front of the class and I was the know-it-all making dumb jokes in the back. I looked forward to the days when math rolled into lunch, so I had an excuse to walk and talk to Ly-Lan on the way to the cafeteria. In the fall, Ly-Lan was on the field hockey team, and while that large, gaggling group of girls ran by me during cross-country warm-ups, we’d each try to steal glances at each other.
In some ways, high school was tough, dealing with all these new and wild emotions. And Peddie had a lot of rules. But we were on the track team and had so much time during the day together. We also had great friends, coaches and teachers. As graduation approached, we planned to go to different colleges and didn’t know where the future would take us. We looked forward to moving on from high school, but we also worried that life wouldn’t be any better or easier than it was right then.
Both proms were memorable. Junior year, we were so new in our relationship and so nervous, but that event definitely set up our relationship (it finally gave me the courage, on the bleachers during track practice, to ask Ly-Lan out). Our first kiss was behind Swig Arts Center. We were so absorbed in each other when we were together. Senior year was totally different: We were more relaxed and able to have fun with our friends. The campus and that N.J. weather were also a big part of the story. We went mud-sliding on the baseball field in a downpour. Got caught in a random hailstorm outside of Swig. On beautiful days, we were either hitting field hockey balls back and forth or on a blanket outside of Potter listening to music with Ly-Lan’s roommate (and later, maid of honor) Laura Oberdorf Koenig ’99. We enjoyed going to events together, like a musical or Vespers, but we could also be on campus and be just totally oblivious to anyone and everyone around us. T.J. McCarthy ’99 and Ly-Lan (Wisler) McCarthy ’99 stand in front of Potter North on the evening of their junior prom. Swig Arts Center. We were so absorbed in Senior year was totally different: honor) Laura Oberdorf Koenig ’99. We enjoyed going to events together, like a musical or Vespers, but we could also be on campus and be just totally oblivious to anyone and everyone around us. VOTED “CUTEST COUPLE” IN THE 1999 YEARBOOK
Paige: We met walking across the football field, preseason, before our junior year, the first year for both of us. I was walking away from campus with some girlfriends, and he was walking back toward campus. We were just friends at Peddie and in the same crowd, and then we both ended up at the University of Alabama, and we began dating when we were there. Another Peddie alumna, Tricia Robles ’89, gathered a little Peddie reunion in Tuscaloosa because Dino Pascarelli ’91 was coming to town, so we hung out that weekend and began dating after that.
It’s so nice for the two of us to have had Peddie in common and we have a lot of the same friends to this day. We’ve kept in touch with so many of our Peddie friends. We share that as our past, and we share it as our present because it was such a great time. And Brad feels the same way. It’s so nice that we can both look back at that together and continue to have it as part of our lives.
We’ve been together at every reunion; we definitely make it back every five years for the big ones. On our 25th, we had all five kids with us, and Brad was inducted into the Sports Hall of Fame for baseball. That was such a special day. His roommate John Coffey ’90 came back to be a part of the ceremony, and my roommate and best friend, Zi-yah Esbenshade ’90, and Denise Sullivan ’90, my oldest daughter’s godmother, came back to support Brad. Peter McClellan ’90 is a classmate of ours and a teammate of Brad’s. Having him be at Peddie, and Mary Tennyson Mahoney ’94, is so wonderful. It’s just the feeling of Peddie and what it gave both of us at a time in our life when we both needed it — needed to be independent and go to boarding school — and Peddie was a game-changer for both of us. We keep in touch with a lot of our classmates. We both loved it. For different reasons, we both needed it at that time in our lives, and it gave us a similar springboard to our lives.
Paige Daggett ’90 and Bradley Daggett ’90 at their June 7, 1997 wedding.
LOVED THE VALENTINE’S DAY GIFT PEDDIE SENT THEM THIS YEAR
The Daggett family celebrates Bradley’s induction into the Peddie Sports Hall of Fame in 2015 (from left): Presley, Holden, Berkeley, Vance and Marley The Daggett family celebrates Bradley’s induction into the Peddie Sports Hall
We met during freshman and sophomore years but didn’t really start spending time together until Mr. Reimann’s English Honors class in winter term of junior year. Our favorite memories are hanging out in the canteen after classes and in the student center after family-style dinners. Junior and senior proms were good times. Conversations with Dean Bill McMann (nicknamed “Bert” in those days) were always fun. Peddie is the root of our relationship, the common experience that we shared and have both grown from. Different paths brought us to Hightstown, but we have been on the same path ever since. Peddie is family for us. If teenagers are looking for heroes aside from their parents, Peddie had no shortage of heroes for us. Faculty influenced our values and helped shape the people that we have become. Having those shared values and that common experience at such a formative age in our lives has kept us aligned for 35 years now. shared values and that common experience at such a formative age in our lives has kept us aligned for
Elena Tompkins ’86 and James Mucciarone ’86 prepare for their senior prom.
JAMES’S BROTHER, PAUL MUCCIARONE ’77, MARRIED MARYJEAN SPATT MUCCIARONE ’80.
James Mucciarone ’86 and Elena Mucciarone ’86James Mucciarone ’86 and Elena Mucciarone ’86
MARY (“BUNKY”) RUNSER ’74 & KEVIN MARRAZZO ’74 Bunky: We don’t recall exactly when we met. We did set crew together with Harry Holcombe. He was wonderful. For years, whenever we would see him at reunion, he would say, “Kevin! Bunky!” We were friends at Peddie. They didn’t have much mixing; they didn’t have dances or anything like that because there were so few girls at the school. We did not actually date until May 1977. But we stayed friends, corresponded by mail, as one did then. And even if we spoke on the phone, it had to be after 11 o’clock because it was much more expensive to call before 11 p.m. We got married August 1, 1981, in the [Ayer Memorial] Chapel. It was a beautiful place to get married.
Peddie was such a good environment and so cohesive. We had the little mailboxes in Wilson Hall, and you could send notes to each other and go check your mail. Everybody pretty much knew most, if not everybody, else. And we were just lucky that we met when we did and had such a supportive environment, and we still love Peddie today. We were clearly wellsuited for each other from the beginning. We’ve just had our 38th anniversary. Kevin: We started out as friends, and that’s the basis of the relationship. And at some point, she wasn’t dating anyone, and I wasn’t dating anyone, and I asked her out. We knew each other as friends and said, “Hey, let’s take this to another level.” Peddie, in general, was just such a great experience. The memories and summoning the recollections is just all great. Especially the Bunky part. Peddie is such a nurturing and enriching environment on many levels — learning, academics, new ideas, friends. We go back to reunion — it was just our 45th Reunion. And for those of you who are old enough to remember 45s (the little records), you would play them on your turntable, and you would put this 45 adapter on it. And Bunky has this symbol on her shirt in the reunion picture — a subtle reference to our 45th reunion. SAW “ANNIE HALL” ON THEIR FIRST DATE
Above: Mary Runser ’74 (bottom row, second right) and Kevin Marrazzo ’74 (bottom row, center) celebrate their 45th Reunion with their Peddie classmates on June 1, 2019. Opposite: Kevin Marrazzo ’74 and Mary Runser ’74 marry at Ayer Memorial Chapel on August 1, 1981.
Did you meet your significant other at Peddie? Let us know! Email your story and photos to editor@peddie.org. For more Peddie love stories, visit peddie.org/chronicle.
