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At Avon Pedagog French will find a unique educational experiment. Two years ago Mrs. Theodate Pope Riddle of Farmington founded the school, financed it, designed and built the buildings in the image of a Cotswold village.* The quadrangle of dormitories is surrounded by workshops, masters' houses, the dining hall, the bank, all roofed with thick red tile, theatrically pre-aged. Some 125 boys attend classes much the same as at any other preparatory school. They hunt, fish, ride on the 3,000-acre estate which slopes gently down to the Farmington Valley. There are no organized athletics.
First provost was Francis Mitchel Froelicher of Johns Hopkins, who retired last year because of ill health. Interested parents† of Avon boys know that among the able teaching staff are Edward Pulling (history), famed oldtime Groton master, and James Appleton Thayer (classics), son of retiring Headmaster William Greenough ("Twill") Thayer of St. Marks (TIME, Dec. 2). Pedagog French's job will be to institute a junior college at Avon, gradually increase the enrolment to 400 boys fitted to enter universities in sophomore year.
* She was also the architect of smart Westover School for girls at Middlebury, Conn.
† Famed Avon parents: Editor Henry Seidel Canby, onetime Governor & Mrs. Gifford Pinchot of Pennsylvania, Poet Archibald MacLeish, Streets in the Moon, The Hamlet of A. MacLeish. Nephews of Professor Robert Andrews Millikan and the late Ambassador Myron T. Herrick also attend the school.