Deerfield Academy

History

Deerfield Academy was founded in 1797 when Massachusetts Governor Samuel Adams granted a charter to found a school in the town of Deerfield. It began to educate students in 1799. The school was prestigious, and graduates occupied many congressional and gubernatorial seats in New England. By the end of the 19th century, industrialization had economically hurt Deerfield, which was rural. The board of trustees was considering closing the Academy, as only nine students remained.

In the early twentieth century, Deerfield appointed Frank Boyden as headmaster. Boyden reorganized the school financially and recruited students from local farms and towns. Boyden also emphasized athletics as a component of education, sometimes playing on varsity squads that lacked players. Boyden retired in 1968.

David M. Pynchon was appointed headmaster after Boyden. He expanding the curriculum, updating the school buildings, and expanded the endowment.

In 1989 the Academy reestablished coeducation, which Boyden had discontinued in 1948. At the time male students had protested the decision.

Eric Widmer '57 served as headmaster from 1994 to 2006. He stepped down in June 2006 and soon after assumed the position of Founding Headmaster at King's Academy in Madaba, Jordan, a school inspired in part by HM King Abdullah II's Deerfield years in the 1980s. It opened in the fall of 2007.

The current Head of School, Margarita O'Byrne Curtis H '57, previously Dean of Studies at Phillips Andover, is the first woman to hold the position.

Traditions

A tradition of Deerfield students takes place on the Sunday of commencement at the end of the year, the night when the graduating senior class has left campus. Students gather on the lower fields and celebrate the school, as well as the coming year, with The Stepping-Up Bonfire. This event is also the place of the debut of the new Captain Deerfield and an opportunity for the Junior Cheerleaders to take the lead. The bonfire has been followed up by a dance for the rising seniors.

Choate Day

The final weekend of the fall sports season is "Choate Day," when the two schools compete in every sport at varsity and sub-varsity levels. The tradition began in 1922 with an exchange of letters between Deerfield head Frank Boyden and Choate head George St. John. Since then, busloads (in the early years, trainloads) of students have made the 80-mile journey along the Connecticut River valley to cheer their teams on the rival's campus.

In the days leading up to the event, rallies and activities are held at both schools. And each campus is decorated in spirited banners and signs to excite the students during the week leading up to the events. At Choate the Boar Pen cheerleaders are selected and a fire-breathing dragon is ignited. At Deerfield in the Main Auditorium, the cheerleaders put on skits mocking their opponents, and there are speeches given by Mr. Morsman, Captain Deerfield, the step team, and the head cheerleaders. In the athletic building, the school seal is encircled by students so that Choate athletes will not tread on it. When events at the Auditorium end, the student body rushes to the lower fields where a bonfire, topped by a burning C, awaits it. Captain Deerfield, the varsity captains, and the cheerleaders rile up the student body with Deerfield cheers and chants.

Co-curricular activities

Students are required to participate in a co-curricular activity each semester. Some options include competitive or intramural sports, community service, dance, theatrical productions every term, yearbook, and many more. In addition, many students are involved in at least one of the more than 50 student-run clubs or organizations.

Sports

Deerfield athletic teams compete with boarding schools and other private schools throughout New England, including Avon Old Farms, Berwick Academy, Berkshire School, Brewster Academy, Bridgton Academy, Brunswick School, Choate Rosemary Hall, Cushing Academy, Hopkins School, Hotchkiss School, Kent School, Loomis Chaffee, Northfield Mount Hermon, Phillips Andover, Phillips Exeter Academy, Salisbury School, South Kent School, Suffield Academy, Tabor Academy, Taft School, Westminster School (Connecticut), Williston Northampton School, and Worcester Academy. The athletic directors of Deerfield and the other members of the Eight Schools Association compose the Eight Schools Athletic Council, which organizes sports events and tournaments among ESA schools. Deerfield is also a member of the New England Preparatory School Athletic Council (NEPSAC).

Around 2010 Deerfield Academy's lacrosse program had success, and was a perennial contender, along with rival Salisbury School, for the New England title. In 2009 Salisbury defeated Deerfield 7-6, resulting in a shared New England Championship title. In 2010 Salisbury defeated Deerfield 9-6. Salisbury went on to win the New England title. However, in 2011 Deerfield beat Salisbury 11-7 in the penultimate game of their season. Deerfield went on to beat Exeter in the last game of their season, securing both an undefeated season and the New England title. They secured the ranking of number one in the state of Massachusetts, and a ranking of number three in the nation. Deerfield's golf, men's water polo, and swimming teams are strong. In 2008 Deerfield held the New England Prep School Championship title for men's swimming, men's water polo, and golf.

Deerfield Academy Press

The Deerfield Academy Press was founded in May 1997 with the publication of Deerfield 1797-1997: A Pictorial History of the Academy, the first written history of the school. The mission of the Press is to stimulate and nurture interest in creative and academic writing and to provide a formal outlet for student writings in English, history, and foreign languages.

Publications:

Notable alumni

Heritage Award

Deerfield Academy recognizes one alumnus every year for its Heritage Award given for "life time civic achievement." Among the past recipients are authors Saul Bellow and John McPhee, District Attorney Robert M. Morgenthau, Senator John Chafee, National Geographic's Gilbert Hovey Grosvenor and youth AIDS activist Dr. John Chittick. The Academy published a book in 2013 about the 30 recipients from 1984 to 2012, Beyond the Valley.

Faculty sexual abuse and Deerfield's response

In 2004 an alumnus revealed to Deerfield's then headmaster Eric Widmer that he had been sexually abused in the Winter of 1983 by faculty member Peter Hindle. Widmer responded sympathetically but did not press for details. The school was aware a parent previously raised concerns about Hindle in the 1980s, and had responded with written and verbal warnings. Nearly a decade later in 2012 the alumnus raised the matter again, this time with headmaster Margarita Curtis, who he says "displayed clear moral authority and offered unconditional support from the start."

An investigation by the school's lawyers confirmed the allegations and uncovered more: In late March 2013 the school published information that two former faculty members had engaged in multiple sexual contacts with students: Peter Hindle who taught at the school from 1956 to his 2000 retirement, and Bryce Lambert who retired in 1990 and had died in 2007. The school stripped Hindle's name from an endowed mathematics teaching chair and a school squash court, and barred him from campus events. A subsequent criminal investigation by the District Attorney's office revealed that at least four teachers, three deceased and one still alive, had engaged in sexual conduct considered "criminal in nature" with students extending back into the 1950s. Their deaths, and the statute of limitations, precluded pursuing criminal charges.

Deerfield spokesman David Thiel said “I think you saw from us an amount of transparency when this came to light that was unusual, and I hope that sets a good example for institutions and helps to assure that students are safer everywhere.”

In books and popular culture

In the book The Headmaster (1966), author John McPhee reviews the life and work of Deerfield's most famous, formative headmaster, Frank Boyden, last of the "magnanimous despots who... created enduring schools through their own individual energies, maintained them under their own absolute rules, and left them forever imprinted with their own personalities.” McPhee spent a year at Deerfield as a postgraduate student.

John Gunther's book Death Be Not Proud (1949) discusses the long struggle of his son John Gunther Jr. (called "Johnny") a Deerfield student, against a deadly brain tumor. The ovation Deerfield students gave the boy as he managed to walk the church aisle to receive the diploma he had earned despite the ravages of the disease, is a powerful—and heartbreaking scene. The book was later made into the 1975 movie Death Be Not Proud, starring Robbie Benson as Johnny Gunther.

Deerfield alumnus and later Horace Mann School history teacher Andrew Trees wrote a satiric novel titled Academy X (2007), a tale of corrupt "transcript primping" set in an unnamed prep school. After publication of the novel Horace Mann declined to renew Mr. Trees' teaching contract. The resulting controversy over academic freedom was reported in a New York Times article, "Private School, Public Fuss".

In Martin Scorsese's 2006 film The Departed, Leonardo DiCaprio's character attended Deerfield. He was kicked out for "wailing on a gym teacher with a chair".

In AMC's television series Mad Men, Pete Campbell attended Deerfield.

Season 11 Bachelorette Contestant Ian Thomson attended Deerfield and, later, Princeton. He left the ABC network show in Week 6 after calling Kaitlyn “a surface level person". During his exit in the episode, he said, "I went to Princeton, Deerfield, and that's what I have to offer.".