accept the validity of reasons once offered for all-male or all-female schools,” according to Repplier. In addition, both schools at the time were looking to expand their physical plant and programs, and a merger promised to aid in that process. “Day Prospect Hill needed space, and Hopkins needed diversification,” felt Shirley Krug ’40 DAY, who served as DPH Director of Admissions during the merger. Different metaphors have been offered to describe the merger. Lisa DeAngelis ’73, one of the first graduates of the mixed school, described it as a birthing: “It was a difficult time, but like any birthing, the final result seemed to diminish the pain.” a slow march toward merging Tentative steps toward cooperation had begun earlier in the 1960s. A joint drama production of The Winslow Boy was put on in 1967. A DPH senior took German at Hopkins in 1968. The Hopkins Grammar Student Council planned a student exchange program with DPH in 1969–70. In 1969, the two heads of school began informal discussions about other ways of cooperation, and several other joint committees of trustees and faculty emerged over the coming years to examine various aspects of working together. But after several alternatives were explored and ultimately abandoned, it wasn’t until the fall of 1971 when the merger took its first strides forward. In September of that year, Hopkins set seventeen conditions for a merger with Day Prospect Hill. Despite some tense moments of negotiation, the Hopkins Committee of Trustees eventually voted in November 1971 to approve the merger contingent upon the sale of the DPH campus. On February 17, 1972, the Hopkins Committee of Trustees voted to approve the merger of the two schools, and on February 29, 1972, the DPH Board followed suit.
President. Allen Sherk, the Headmaster of Hopkins Grammar School, was to be the first Headmaster of the new school, dubbed “Hopkins Grammar Day Prospect Hill School” (the School began referring to itself as “Hopkins School” in 1990). In September 1972, the School opened with a new, hastily constructed building named the Day Prospect Hill Building to house the Junior School, and a student body of 200 “ladies” and 367 “gentlemen.” “tumultuous” first year In her recollection of the first year of the merger, the Student Council President in 1973, Lisa DeAngelis, described it as a “tumultuous” time: Previously anticipated with great excitement, it [the merger] no longer seemed as fun or hopeful as when it existed in speculation alone. Instead, many of us felt cheated and betrayed... we felt as if the world had been pulled out from under us. We had to move to their campus, have their headmaster, use their schedule. Our students and faculty alike were outnumbered two to one; we were swallowed up. For the boys... we were unnecessary intrud- ers in their inner sanctum. They had to cope with sharing their athletic fields, establishing a lower school, and making their school name totally unmanageable. They felt dispersed; their unity had been shattered. There seemed only one option available to any of us: resistance. The struggles played out over issues such as the structure of the student government, the DPH class ring ceremony, caps and gowns versus white dresses for graduation, access to athletic facilities, and the names of student organizations. An HGS student, Philip Mancini ’73, recalled his experiences working on the yearbook. It was decided at the beginning that the book would have a new name altogether different from either of its predecessors, but “[t]he real battle came over the dedication and how it was to be decided. In the end, it was decided not to decide, and there was no dedication in our first yearbook.” For the boys,
The first meeting of the joint Board of Trustees was held on March 13, 1972, where Louis Martz of Hopkins was elected to be
lisa deangelis ’73
philip mancini ’73
dana blanchard ’63 hgs
heidi dawidoff
6
2023 • ISSUE 1 | VIEWS FROM THE HILL
Made with FlippingBook - professional solution for displaying marketing and sales documents online