Category: Stories

Written by Jane Gutsell

            When I sat down recently with Libby Alspaugh and asked her to share what she considered most special about Greensboro Day School, she replied, “It was being able to provide our children –and then later our grandchildren – with the best possible education, which allowed them to broaden themselves not just academically but in many ways, knowing that they would go off to college well-prepared for every challenge.”  One cannot be in conversation with Libby for long before the word “family” becomes the most important theme.  So let us back up to the fall of 1971.

            At the beginning of that school year, three Alspaugh children entered the Day School:  Anne in the 6^th grade, Elaine in the 4^th, and Andy in the 1^st.  During that time Libby helped out on a volunteer basis with whatever needed to be done but primarily with the then all-school library, which was located where the Head of School’s office is now.  Everything – all classes, the lunchroom, and library – were in that one building.  Libby had earned a bachelor’s degree in religion and a teaching certificate in social studies from Greensboro College, but did not have any classes in library science.  In the summer of 1973 her youngest Michael entered the Kindergarten program when acting headmaster Jack Wenrick called her and said, “Libby, our librarian has just resigned and school will open in a week.  What should I do?”  To which she replied, “Jack, don’t worry.  I can open the library while you look for a permanent librarian.”  All on her usual voluntary basis.  Now all four of the children are there, and days turned into weeks, and weeks into months.  “Jack,” she asked, “how is the search going?”  “Well, we’re trying.”  So fairly soon after that she took matters into her own hands and proposed that she come on as Lower and Middle School librarian permanently while taking classes at night and during the summer in order to get a Master’s in Library Science from UNC-G.  It took three and half years to accomplish this, and Libby went on to be the Lower School librarian until she retired in 2003.  Even then she continued to actively substitute for another 10 years!  The best thing, she says, about subbing is that the lessons plan are already made and “no faculty meetings!”

In addition to her full-time position at school, Libby, at the instigation of Kathy Davis, took on coaching girls from 8 – 12 years of age for the Greensboro Youth Soccer League, all the way through coaching her granddaughter Savannah’s team.  Many of her players were GDS students, and her teams achieved many state championships.

Libby was known fondly by teachers and students by another of her many roles, the ‘Tooth Fairy’. Countless alumni recall the number of teeth Libby pulled during her time in the lower school.  If there was a tooth that needed some help, Libby knew just how to get it out! 

During her long tenure at the Day School, Libby taught all four of her own children and four of her grandchildren.  She has known so many children and children of children and their friends and families that she is always running into people she knows as a result of her connection with the school.  Consequently, Greensboro Day School “has remained a wonderful constant in the lives of the Alspaugh family.”  GDS is truly her family in unique and special ways.

Libby and her husband Jim made a trip to California to celebrate their 50^th wedding anniversary.  They toured the wine district but truly enjoyed tracing the old missions down the coast.  And that was 10 years ago!  Today her main concentration has been following the careers of her children and the lives of their nine grandchildren.  She has also been delving seriously into the genealogies of both her family and Jim’s so that the younger generation will have important knowledge of their family history.  This effort has re-connected her with many cousins who are now also in the process of adding bits and pieces to the stories.

She volunteers a lot at her church, Westminster Presbyterian.  Knowing how much she enjoys projects, they are always giving her plenty to do.  She loves staying active, but after two busy careers, Jim and Libby are happy to be able to garden and read, while at the same time enjoying the more settled, quiet, lovely life they have now.   “We have,” she says with pleasure and conviction, “been given the gift of time.”

At GDS:

Varsity Women’s Lacrosse

Student Council

Moot Court

After GDS:

BA in Philosophy with Distinction

Minors in French, Law and Legal Reasoning

Kappa Kappa Gamma

Dallas Urban Debate Alliance

SMU Dedman School of Law

Following graduation from Greensboro Day, Mary Kathryn attended Southern Methodist University where she studied Philosophy, French, as well as Law & Legal Reasoning. Much like she did at GDS, Mary Kathryn excelled in the classroom and was the recipient of many awards and scholarships during her time at SMU. In addition to receiving the Ehlin Hoskins Philosophy Essay of the Year Award in 2017, Mary Kathryn was also named a “Hunt Leadership Scholar” and “Dedman College Scholar” which are both merit-based scholarships given to students who exemplify exceptional leadership and academic performance. Outside the classroom, Mary Kathryn was a member of Phi Beta Kappa Honor Society as well as Kappa Kappa Gamma Sorority, where she served as Vice President of Academic Excellence. She also volunteered as a judge for the “Dallas Urban Debate Alliance.”

Mary Kathryn graduated with distinction in May 2018 and currently attends SMU Dedman School of Law as a candidate for Juris Doctor ’21. She was one of five students to receive the Hatton W. Sumners Scholarship which is a merit-based, full-tuition scholarship given to students who demonstrate academic excellence, a sense of civic responsibility, and potential for leadership.

Written by Jane Gutsell

Sue Kody Seagraves, former Upper School Art teacher, is truly a woman for all seasons.  Over the years, her interests and passions in life have ranged from art and art history to architecture, cooking, Japanese maples, travel, reading, gardening, and of course, her family.  With a B. S. in Art and a minor in English from Concord College in Athens, West Virginia and a M.F.A. in Art from UNCG, Sue was invited to join the GDS faculty by Jim Hendrix in 1976 to fill in for the Lower School art teacher who was on maternity leave.  Jim also wanted her to teach English, but Sue suggested that he get in touch with a woman she had met when they taught together at Gillespie, and thus GDS had the good fortune to also acquire Tricia Fish as an Upper School English teacher.

            For a brief but important time after that, Sue shared 4^th grade teaching responsibilities with Carmen Redding. “Carmen,” she says, “was very influential to me.  She was my first exposure to a real teacher in a real classroom.  I learned a lot from her.”  Gradually, Sue moved from part-time in both Middle and Upper Schools and in 1978 became the full-time U.S. Art teacher, whose responsibilities included not just basic painting and drawing classes but also photography and ceramics and AP Art. She helped design the Art Survey course as well.  Photography, which she says she knew nothing about at the time and took classes at UNCG to learn, has become one of her life’s passions.

            Sue retired in 2003, but until just a couple of years ago, stayed actively involved with the drama program in all three divisions, helping to paint sets for many productions.  She has worked especially closely with Dana Lowell in the Upper School drama department on both fall musicals and spring dramas. 

            Since retirement, Sue has spent a lot of time with her four children and five grandchildren.  Mostly she says she just tries to keep up with them, entertain them, and lure them over for visits with her and her husband Ed with her home-cooked meals.  Her son-in-law is our own Middle School Director, Barry Davis!

            In the late 1990s she and Ed started their own very labor intensive Japanese maple business and began taking horticultural classes at Forsyth Technical Community College. It took the first seven years before the small grafted trees they had purchased were ready to sell.  They had at least fifty varieties and, as the business grew, somewhere between six and seven thousand trees, which they sold to garden centers, farmers markets, and the general public.  They stayed busy with their trees until 2014.

            Another of Sue’s passions is travel.  Her first adventure began with a summer enrichment grant which took her to Paris, Nice, and other cities in France.  And, as she says, “that was that.  I got the bug.”  A subsequent grant sent her to Italy for art history classes and tours through Rome, Florence, and Venice. Later she went with the second group of Upper School students on the exchange trip to Russia.  “Getting out of the country to see art just changed my life.”

            Since 2003 Sue has travelled to the United Kingdom and Japan where she visited beautiful gardens with her beloved Japanese maples and shrines and temples.  Then to Greece and Turkey for art, architecture, and archeology.  In 2014 I joined her on a two-week trip to Belgium and Holland to learn about 17^th Century Flemish and Dutch paintings, cathedrals, and much more.  One lovely summer afternoon GDS alumna Corinna Scott ’95 took us boating through the canals of Amsterdam.  At the end of the trip, Sue went off on her own to spend another week in Paris.  All day every day, she visited as many museums as she could pack into a day and still didn’t see everything she wanted to see!

            One of the things Sue is most proud of is that, while she was at UNCG, she was one of the four original founders of the Green Hill Gallery. As a member of the Greensboro Artists League, she and others wanted a place to show their work and so they put their minds to purchasing an old house on the land occupied by Green Hill Cemetery and made it happen. 

            Now she enjoys relaxing at their cottage, which she completely remodeled, on a lake in Rockingham County – kayaking, gardening, reading, entertaining friends.  Last year she remodeled their Greensboro home.  She has stayed in close touch with a group of GDS retirees, whose friendships she values very much.  She has also returned to her first love – watercolors.  She is painting almost every day and was one of nine women artists who exhibited their work at The Penn House in Reidsville this past September.

            The main thing Sue enjoyed about her time at the Day School was her students.  It was “thrilling to work with students who loved art and to see them excel.”  She is “always pleased to hear about those who have succeeded in having a career in art.”  Sue Seagraves was an important mentor and role model for her many students in so many ways that it would only be fair to call her a Renaissance woman.

Anne and Sam Hummel have been impacting Greensboro Day School for over 40 years.  Their children, Elizabeth ’89, enrolled in GDS in 1976, daughter, Holmes ’94, in 1981, Amelia ’95 in 1982, and son, Sam ’99, in 1985.  The family saw tremendous growth at the school, both in size and achievement. To this day, they are proud of the education foundation their children received at Greensboro Day School.

With a recent leadership gift in celebration of the school’s upcoming 50th anniversary, the Hummels’ donation offers their generous support to help Greensboro Day School continue to fulfill its mission as they have for organizations throughout the Greensboro community.  

The Hummel’s four children were very active students throughout their years here, growing and learning to become the “constructive contributors” that they are as adults with their own families today.  All of them continue to reside in NC, and each has shown the powerful effects of this community-serving, philanthropic family. Several of Anne’s focus areas have been the local YWCA, JDRF, and the downtown…..Theatre.  While Sam has shared in all of these passionate efforts, he is a champion of Rotary and our Greensboro community spirit (UNCLE SAM, he is), too. Again, just to name a few. Local arts groups and other social services receive the Hummel touch, as well.

When asked about the particular area for this generous endowment gift, Anne and Sam decided that their 50th anniversary support would go towards GDS’s value for diversity through financial aid, as they say, “a big need at the school.”  They have placed their contribution in the Bob Demaree Financial Aid Endowment, recognizing the former Upper School Director who impacted their children, inspiring others to reach for their dreams.  

Anne has served GDS as a Board member, one capable of powerful focus and persistence, leading a strategic planning process during her final 3-year term.  Both Anne and Sam were very present in their children’s education here at Greensboro Day School as they knew that their presence was necessary and showed the commitment of time and resources vital to individual progress of each child and to the growth of the School.  They honored their children with a significant donation to our Generations’ Campaign, placing their name on the beautiful 8th grade science lab in the Bell Family Middle School.  

Anne and Sam are “Leaders amongst Leaders” who make their difference throughout their communities.  Greensboro Day School is a better place because of their families’ involvement on this campus over most of its 50 years.   

With the 50^th anniversary upon us, it is important for our community to continue giving back.  We hope that other past families will follow the Hummel’s lead in helping support Greensboro Day School so that is continue to fulfill its mission to providing  the foundations students need to constructive contributors to the world.  

If you are interested in learning more about the endowment opportunities in support of the 50^th Anniversary, please contact Tommy Webb at tommywebb@greensboroday.org or 336-288-8590.

Written by Dr. Mihan House McKenna Taylor ’95
(In accepting the 2019 Distinguished Alumni Award)

Thank you, Greensboro Day School! It is an honor to be recognized for what I do—blowing things up for the betterment of humanity! In all seriousness, the motto of the US Army ERDC is Making the World a Safer, Better Place, Every day. My career has reflected that in all that I have done, and it has been a fun, wild ride at that. I’ve been to places most people will never see, and blown up things most people would never imagined were flammable! We joke that our motto should be, “There is no day that cannot be made better through the proper application of C4”, and while it is true that detonations can be good therapy, you can also get it wrong. Like the time the team accidentally blew up the field truck instead of the target. Whoops.

There can be no explosion without a spark. I would like to invite you all to look to the emblem of the GDS—the torch. While a student here, I imagined the torch as a light-bringer, but as I grew, I realized that fire has a power to transform. The nuclear explosions I researched could turn the desert sands to sheets of glass. So, too, will you take the discrete grains that make up your experiences in life and forge them into something new, like glass blowers use flames to create works of art from sand and fire. Right now, you’re in a glass mold created by your families and your teachers. You’ll have the opportunity to take the shape they gave you, or break the mold and become whatever you can dream. When I was sitting where you are now, I thought the mold my past gave me was the only option, and admittedly, the goblet I became was fabulous: a sparkly vessel to toast my own successes!

But like the time that truck met the great mechanic in the sky due to a perhaps overzealous and incautious application of explosives, the world can change in an instant. We fear the fragility of our own existence, the crystalline perfection of our imagined glasses. About eight years ago, my goblet was obliterated into a million shards: I died in public, in front of work colleagues and friends, came back, was given two years to live, got divorced and had to figure out how to rebuild my existence. I have to say, that was a pretty big unexpected explosion.

But I was still holding tight to the torch that GDS passed to me, those qualities of leadership, scholarship, sportsmanship, drive, and determination, and told the universe, “Not today. I will take these fragments and remold myself into something new, something better.” So I swept up the shards, and forged myself into a pitcher to pour out a better future for others. I beat back the darkness, beat my life expectancy, rebuilt a future that I fully intend to inhabit. Today I can say thank you to the school that gave me those tools.

So I say to you all, you are more than the sum of your fractures. Do not be afraid of shattering, because GDS has given you the skills to be your own mold maker. Just as I may not have been able to see what I could become, the Empress of Weird Science and protector of the USACE and Army’s basic research, until I was nothing but sand once again, you won’t know what you are capable of until you have done it. So I challenge you to be a pitcher and not a goblet, to light the fires of your own explosions, and to never let the light GDS gives you go out. Burn bright!

At GDS

Headmaster’s List every semester
National Honors Society
Winner of the Gold Key Scholastic Art Award
Attended The Governor’s School of North Carolina for studio art

After GDS:

B.A. in Studio Art at Sewanee: The University of the South, with honors and cum laude
Abstract expressionist painter with representation in Greensboro, Charlotte, Atlanta, Dallas and Chicago
Involvement in the Komen Race for the Cure, Spoleto USA, Redux Contemporary Art Center, The Greenhill Center for the Arts, and the Junior League of Charleston.

Kate Long Stevenson has had a passion for art her whole life. Her talent was nurtured and encouraged by both her family and her teachers at GDS, who instilled the discipline and work ethic she would find invaluable as a professional, working artist. After graduating from GDS in 1999, Stevenson enrolled at Sewanee: The University of the South. Never intending to study art, but after stumbling into a painting class, she has never looked back. Since college, Stevenson has worked as an abstract expressionist painter, exhibiting and selling her work in several galleries throughout Charleston, SC, Atlanta, Charlotte, Greensboro, Dallas, and Chicago. Stevenson’s gestural brushstrokes and a passion for color are characteristic to all of her pieces, ranging from figurative paintings to wild abstracts. A life-long lover of music, Stevenson relies on mostly classical compositions to guide her as she builds a painting, layering chords of color over energetic swirls of charcoal and paint.

Written By Jane Gutsell

            In early spring, Robert H. Demaree, Jr. – affectionately known by one and all as “Bob” – sat down with me for lunch in a lovely dining room at Twin Lakes Retirement Community in Burlington for a pleasant visit remembering his time at Greensboro Day School and his impressively busy life since retiring in December 2001.

            With a BA in Latin from UNC-Chapel Hill and an MA in Latin from Emory University and

having been Headmaster of Southfield School in Shreveport, Louisiana for seven years, Bob came to the Day School as Upper School Director, succeeding Robert Dobson, in 1985.  In addition to those multifarious and demanding responsibilities,  for many years he also taught a section of  Upper School Latin at a time when all administrators were expected to stay connected personally to the core experience of classroom teaching. Those were years of curriculum and faculty development and steady growth in the student body.  Bob fondly remembers “enjoying students and colleagues” during his tenure.

            Then in 1994 Bob decided he needed a change.  The school then wisely relied on him over the years before his retirement to be the Directors of Financial Aid, College Counseling, Public Relations, and Publications – an impressive range of activities requiring many different skills, all of which he gracefully and successfully managed.

          He began writing poetry in the 1980s and his “ little pieces,” as he calls them, have over the years appeared in over 150 periodicals.  Early on he published two chapbooks, New Hampshire Pond and Things He Thought He Already Knew.  It is no understatement to say that poetry has been since then a central focus of his life.  In 2007 Beech River Books, a small independent New England press, began their association with Bob with the publication of Fathers and Teachers.  This collection was followed in 2009 by Mileposts, After Labor Day in 2014, and most recently in 2017 Other Ladders.  Bob’s poems are suffused with a quiet sense of people and places and time – sometimes ironic, other times subtly wise, and always a pleasure to read.  On a personal note, Bob has been an important mentor to me in my poetry writing efforts and unfailing in his encouragement.  I hope that many of the readers of this piece will seek out and read his poems.

           In addition to these accomplishments, Bob was also asked to write the official history of Greensboro Day School from its beginnings in 1970 to 1995 –  Lo, Hearts Behold,        an invaluable testament to the vision and mission of the school’s founders and, as Bob’s concludes the history, “a tribute to dreamers.”

            Bob and Martha, who have been married 54 years, have two daughters, Virginia and Caroline (a 1987 GDS alumna).  Virginia lives in Raleigh and has two children, one attending NC State University and the other a high school senior.  Caroline lives in Durham and has college freshmen twins, one in UNC-CH and the other at UCLA, and her third in the 8^th grade.  When asked if he and Martha had travel plans, he laughingly quoted Henry David Thoreau by saying that they “traveled a great deal” between Twin Lakes and those two nearby cities visiting their daughters and grandchildren. 

            Their significant travels involve spending June through September at a family cottage on a lake in Wolfeboro, New Hampshire.  Built by his parents in the 1950s, this has been another central place in his life.  Many of his poems are set in this serene part of the world.  Each summer members of their family spend at least a week or so there kayaking, hiking, swimming, keeping the woods picked up, and attending poetry events.  And traveling a bit in the Maritime provinces, he adds.

            After moving to Twin Lakes in 2006, Bob has taken on a multitude of responsibilities.  He coordinates the community’s Poets Lariats and the Harbor Poetry Club, serves as an editor of the Twin Lakes Literary Review, and organizes spring and fall poetry festivals.  He also chairs the Twin Lakes Auxiliary’s Gala Fundraiser, a Scholarship Committee funded by residents, and the Enrichment Committee, which sponsors lectures, field trips to opera performances and art exhibits, and other educational opportunities for residents.  In Greensboro, he teaches a winter term course for Shepherd’s Center entitled “Access to Contemporary Poetry.”  Again with a typical Bob Demaree smile, when asked if there were things in life that he would like to do and hadn’t yet, he replied that, “for possibly obvious reasons, I have avoided compiling a bucket list.”  But he has become quite interested in  contemporary novelists, such as Annie Proulx, Sue Miller and the North Carolinian Wiley Cash.  He particularly enjoys the work of Richard Ford, whom he calls the best American writing today.

            In conclusion, Bob enjoys keeping up with old and dear friends such as David Gilbert. A Bengal basketball fan, he and former U. S. Director Terry Buxton attend at least one game every year.  He also felt privileged to have been asked to speak at Bob Satterfield’s retirement celebration in April 2007. Bob affirms that his hope for Greensboro Day School is that it “will be able, as it always has been, to be true to core values in changing and sometimes difficult times.”

Jean and Bob Rapp became parents at Greensboro Day School in 1987 when they enrolled their daughter, Katherine ’93, in 7^th grade.  Little did they know at that time that their relationship with GDS would be even stronger 31 years later. Today, as grandparents of Adelaide ’22, Adair ’23, and Reston ’26, their love for Greensboro Day School runs deep. 

This past spring, a tear could be seen running down Bob’s face as he watched his oldest granddaughter receive the Middle School’s Leadership Award at the 8^th Grade Closing.  In this moment, Bob knew he wanted to do something for “his girls”. 

Leaving that graduation, leadership left a mark on Bob.  Bob knows that Katherine’s education at GDS gave her the foundation she needed to be successful and is most proud of the job she has done raising her 3 girls.  He decided he wanted to make a gift to the school in order to endow student leadership opportunities.

At Greensboro Day School, students develop not only intellectually, but also interpersonally. Through academics, service learning, athletics, arts, and other extracurricular opportunities, students gain self-confidence, practice leadership, and ethical decision making. Whether through serving as a reading buddy in Lower School, participating in Learning2Lead as a Middle School student, or presenting to the entire Upper School during Assembly, GDS students take advantage of new leadership opportunities and experiences each day.

Bob and Jean’s generous gift was made in honor of their granddaughters, Adelaide, Adair and Reston and named in honor of their daughter. The Katherine Rapp Wood ’93 Leadership Endowment will give the school the ability to fund student leadership opportunities that will give students more experiences to develop leadership skills that will enhance the school’s mission “to provide the foundations students need to become constructive contributors to the world.”

We, at Greensboro Day School, are so thankful for the Rapp’s generous gift. 

Grandparents are vital to the financial stability of GDS. Our Grandparents have a wonderful opportunity to add to the incredible education that their grandchildren are receiving at Greensboro Day School.

If you are interested in learning more about how you can support Greensboro Day School, please reach out to Tommy Webb at (336) 288-8590 or tommywebb@greensboroday.org. 

Written By Jane Gutsell

Forty years ago, a very special person walked into Greensboro Day School’s Lower Division as one of only three Language Arts & Science sixth-grade teachers.  That special person was Marilyn Jones, who until her retirement in June 2012, was instrumental in guiding hundreds of young people and the school through myriad and exciting changes.

            In 1978 sixth grade was still in the Lower School but soon moved out of that building and into what is now the Board Room.  In 1982  it was incorporated into the Middle School.  But not until Craig Head was hired in 1988 did the sixth grade have a dedicated Science teacher.  Thus, Marilyn was still teaching both Language Arts and Science as Chairman of the English Department. At that time she asked Headmaster Ralph Davison to move her to seventh and eighth grade English, which she taught for three years before deciding to return to her first love – the lucky Sixth Grade!  (On a personal note, she made this change the very same year that my daughter –class of ’97 – would have had her in seventh grade.  I was chairing the English department at that time and tried to talk Marilyn into staying the seventh grade teacher just one more year, but she knew what she wanted and that was that.)

            During her tenure in the Middle School, the Language Arts/English curriculum changed to an increased focus on grammar, literature, and expository writing.  Before returning to sixth grade, Marilyn particularly enjoyed teaching students for more than one year so that she could actually experience their progress.  She also enjoyed the special challenge of teaching with her eighth grade colleague, now Assistant Head of School Tommy Webb.  Their team work involved in devising projects, writing assignments, thinking through the syllabus – all appealed to her interest in trying out new things.  Later, she and another MS English teacher Grey Craven were recipients of a Summer Teaching Enrichment Grant, which took them to St. Louis and Hannibal, Missouri to develop a Mark Twin curriculum.  Students read The Adventures of Tom Sawyer in the summer and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn during the school year.  Talk about a challenge!

            Long before we were a “laptop” school, Marilyn experimented with using computers.  She began a Pen Pal club with students in foreign countries.  They wrote about their reading and students activities every week, taking turns at the ONE desktop. No wonder that Marilyn was only the third recipient of the distinguished Hendrix Award for Teaching Excellence.

             Never one to rest on her laurels, back in sixth grade, she completely revised the reading and writing curriculum to include more focus on “process” with journaling and allowing students to choose their own books.  Each week each student would write a “letter to a friend” about their reading, and every Friday afternoon she spent reading 60 letters! 

            In addition to teaching and chairing the English Department, Marilyn has been an integral part of the whole school.  Beginning in1978 for ten years, Freddy Johnson had her coaching JV tennis, cheerleading, and boys’ golf.  She served on the MS faculty Council planning dances, and projects such as the Big Orange Drive!  She was one of the teachers to initiate the IOI (Improvement of Instruction) program, serving on the steering committee for four years.  In 2006, she was chairing the IOI when the faculty built a Habitat for Humanity house in honor of Dr. Davison’s 20^th year as Headmaster.  Somehow she even managed to keep it a surprise!

            One of her proudest achievements was helping to organize the Outdoor Education Program.  Students enjoyed outdoors experiences at places such as Camp Seagull, Camp Broadstone, camping near Flat Rock, NC and another in Gatlinburg, TN.  These were a highlight of the MS program and among her special memories.  In 2002 she received the Brooks Summer sabbatical to go to Germany on a family genealogy exploration with her sister. 

            I asked Marilyn what she and Morgan, her husband of 46 years, have been doing since her retirement and her emphatic one-word answer was “Travel!”   Her second one-word answer was “Fly-fishing!”  They have fished the Watauga River, the Mitchell River, the North Platte and the Snake in Wyoming, and rivers in Montana.  She loves both the challenge and the peacefulness of standing in waders in flowing cold water with a rod in her hand and tackle strapped to her waist.

             For the last five years during the first week of August, she and Morgan have cooked and washed dishes as volunteers for 160 young people at an evangelical camp for a local Air Force base, ranchers, and Native American kids.   They love every minute of it.

            Every Monday night she tutors one-on-one at Friendly Avenue Baptist Church.  Currently she is working with a young Hispanic boy on reading, writing, and math.  She also mentors and teaches with Val Vickers, former MS Science teacher, at the Washington Montessori School.  The old saying, “Once a teacher, always a teacher” goes double for Marilyn.

            Two years ago, she and Morgan went with Kay Zimmerman, former MS Latin teacher, and her husband Charlie out west to tour National Monuments – the Grand Canyon, Zion, Arches, Bryce Canyon, and Mt. Rushmore.  Next year she is hoping to make a trip to Ireland and Wales with her sister and six cousins to continue her work on family genealogy.

            Marilyn loves remembering the great, wonderful teaching experiences she had with colleagues and students under the special guidance of Ed Dickinson, former MS director.  She had taught for 10 years in the public school system but says that the positive atmosphere and collegiality of the Day School were truly unique.  She loves to socialize and looks forward to the monthly retired MS faculty lunches. They call themselves the “FREEDOM Group,” which stands for “Friendly Retired Educators Enjoying Dining Out Monthly”! 

            That hot summer day in August 1978 when Marilyn Jones stepped onto a very different campus from the one GDS occupies now was one of our school’s luckiest.  Once a Bengal, Always a Bengal!