WEBB Magazine excerpt: The Final Word Spring/Summer 2018

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T HE WEBB SCHOOL S webb.org

SPRING/SUMMER 2018 WEBB M AGA ZINE

The Final Word We begin the journey to examine our origin story and how it will inform the future.

T

he origin story of an idea or a place often bends as you approach it, particularly after 100 years have passed—particularly after stories of stories have been told and re-told from generation to generation. The flexibility of human memory and the irresistible desire to tell a good story don’t help much either. Webb is a good story. Its founding. Its struggle. Its persistence. Its long years of thriving success. The facts and fictions are equally satisfying. And now, as Webb approaches The Centennial, in fact, as it has just enrolled The Centennial Class of 2022 for the fall term, we begin the journey to examine our origin story and how it will inform the future. Pictured above is a set of images of the fi rst school catalogue Thompson Webb published—a book of some 20 pages given or mailed to families that showed

an interest. It is without a date, but researching the cost of tuition noted in the book, it is likely from the second or third year—either 1923-24 or 1924-25. The cost of tuition for the year was $1,000— to be paid as follows: “Six hundred dollars on or before the opening day of school, in September, and four hundred dollars on or before the re-assembling day after the Christmas vacation.” This fi rst catalogue begins with a short biography of Thompson Webb, followed by descriptions of school philosophy, location, buildings and grounds, health, outdoor life, horseback riding and more. The Claremont Colleges are mentioned, for providing Webb students the opportunity to hear music and lectures of the highest type. There is a section on discipline, one of the lengthier entries actually, which begins with this simple opening: “The ordinary rules of morality and honor

are in force, not as rules of the school, but as rules of civilized life. Every boy is expected to be a gentleman under all circumstances.” Expectations clarified. And fi nally in this fi rst school catalogue, and most fitting for this issue of WEBB Magazine highlighting our innovative curriculum, Thompson Webb’s Course of Study open above. It takes up some four pages, the lengthiest section in the catalogue. Reading it now you can see the care and attention Thompson Webb invested in the intellectual life of the school. He certainly valued and counted on his faculty. “Each instructor is allowed some latitude of choice to give vent to his personal enthusiasm, and to suit the course to the students concerned.” Ray Alf, of course, immediately comes to mind. And still today, this is a sentiment shared and built upon.


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