Mr. O

Last week through the bare boles of the trees, past the stocky, red-brick buildings of Pomfret School, a sombre hearse made its way. As it must to all men, Death had come to Headmaster William Beach Olmsted, whom Pomfret boys have affectionately, awesomely known as "Mr. O" for 32 years. Pomfret boys knew that he was not leaving the school as he had found it.

Graduated from Trinity College (Hartford) in 1887, Professor Olmsted began teaching at St. Mark's. In 1897 he left to go to what was then called Peck's School, a sparse collection of school buildings on a hill a mile south of Pomfret, Conn. Within three decades he fashioned it into an orderly T-shaped array of modern Colonial dormitories and classrooms, looking confidently across wide, well kept grounds. He gathered an able faculty, capable of educating educables as well as any of the famed New England schools.

He dignified his institution with the name Pomfret School in 1899. Ten years later his brother, Bishop Charles Sanford Olmsted of Arizona, ordained him a Protestant Episcopal priest. Wise to the necessity of enlarging his plant through the generosity of parents and alumni, Mr. O had Pomfret fitted out as became a Good Eastern School. A $135,000 Romanesque chapel, the gift of Trustee E. Walter Clark, was brought stone by stone, slate by slate from England. In keeping, Mr. O made his 140 boys wear starched white collars when they went within to worship.

As Pomfret became more and more a "hard-collar" school, its worldly goods were added unto. From Banker Edward R. Stettinius, from the late Morton F. Plant of New London came schoolhouses and dormitories. Mrs. Frederic E. Lewis of Ridgefield gave a gymnasium. Mr. O saw to it that his students used chapel, schoolhouses and gymnasium faithfully and fruitfully. His was a one-man school.

Physical fitness was the insistent credo of great-bodied, florid, sandy-haired Mr. 0. He governed his charges like an ironhanded country squire, his severity being tempered on occasion by notable Mrs. O, herself the mother of two Pomfret boys. William and Frederick. When a boy slouched round-shouldered out of the dining room. Mr. O's eye was upon him and that boy was sent to get more exercise, more fresh air. Except for a real excuse, every boy had to play football and Mr. O went to the field every day to watch one and all, issue brusque suggestions, take mental notes to pass on to parents.

The same rigor was applied in scholarship and discipline. It was Mr. O's pride that Pomfret boys have more than held their own among boys from bigger schools both in studies and athletics. The most unusual mind (Schuyler B. Jackson. 1922) that Princeton has had in years was awakened at Pomfret. Yale's Mallory and Harvard's Buell were Pomfret bred footballers of recent fame. From Pomfret to Harvard went a great stroke oar, George Appleton; for Pomfret, like Kent, is one of the few rowing schools.

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