For the generations of children who have grown up on the Exeter campus, school is home—and a pretty neat playground, too.

Article by Bob Reinert

When Exeter students gaze across campus, they see dormitories, classroom buildings and expansive lawns. But another group views it differently. To them, these same landmarks are their homes, parents’ workplaces and personal playgrounds. In short, this is their neighborhood, and they know every square inch of it.

They are “faculty brats,” the sons and daughters of Exeter instructors and administrators. They grow up on campus and many of them go on to attend the Academy. Some even go on to become teachers, and a few return here to work and raise their own families. Wherever their lives take them, they bring along a unique perspective on the Academy.

Today the Exeter campus is home to well over 100 children, 52 of whom are 5 years old or younger. Shown here are (clockwise from upper left): Paula and Miguel Perez-Glassner; Eva Gruesser and her daughter, Mirella Gruesser-Smith; and Eli Kushner.

Last June, a group of 58 faculty children who grew up on campus during the 1950s and 1960s came back for what they billed as “The First Unofficial Faculty Brat Family Reunion” (see sidebar, page 20). “That was a pretty extraordinary event,” says David Swift ’64, an Exeter math instructor who helped organize it. “A lot of people came together who hadn’t seen each other for many, many years.” Swift and his brothers, Charlie ’58 and Tom ’60, grew up on campus, where their father, the late Charles Swift ’31, was a math instructor and one-time dean of faculty.

What’s it like to grow up at Exeter? How has that experience changed over the years? There are probably as many answers to those questions as there are faculty children. “I don’t think there’s a better place to bring up a family,” says Pat Dennehy ’92, whose father is varsity soccer and baseball coach Bill Dennehy, a member of the physical education department since 1971. “It’s a small community within a community. I think it was a healthy way to grow up. It’s a very rich lifestyle—rich in relationships and rich in the people you meet.” Adds Swift with a chuckle: “It was certainly not the real world. It was a pretty good life.”

The World at Their Doorstep

According to Dean of Faculty Barbara Eggers, as the 2003–04 school year begins, the “fac brat” count now tops 150, and a majority of those kids live on campus. Among them are Jacob, Madeleine and Eliza Sneeden, who live with their parents, Ralph and Gwen Sneeden, in Cilley Hall. Ralph teaches English; Gwen administers the summer teaching conferences on campus. Raising their family at Exeter “is unique,” Gwen says. “The world comes through here. You don’t have to go anywhere. Our lives are so enriched by the kids who attend Exeter. I think it’s the best thing.”

Lucky for Dan Brown ’82, there was plenty at Exeter to keep a young mind occupied. “My parents [emeritus math instructor Dick Brown and writer Connie Brown] were not wild about the influence of television, and so for many years we did not own one,” says Brown, the best-selling author of The Da Vinci Code. “Our evening entertainment consisted of attending events on the Exeter campus—student concerts, plays, art shows, sporting events. I had no idea what I was missing on television until kids at school started telling me about ‘Charlie’s Angels.’ That was the year I discovered the TV in the Dunbar common room.”

One of the main features of growing up in a dormitory or faculty housing at Exeter is the close interaction between faculty children and students. The latter often become older brothers and sisters, mentors, friends and, of course, babysitters. And like all “sibling” relationships, there are many rewards and occasional rivalries.

“You were constantly amazed by the talent of the students,” says Mike Mahoney ’88, whose father is Rick Mahoney ’61; ’74, ’95 (Hon.), is the Academy’s director of financial aid. “That kind of awe faded as we got older. They have their flaws, just like everyone else does.”

Sometimes, faculty children decide that a preemptive strike is their best strategy. For example, Dennehy made a weapon of his Big Wheel tricycle. “I used to just scream down that hill behind Abbot [Hall] and make people move out of my way,“ he says. “I just remember roaming around campus and causing trouble.”

Holidays are big on campus, including this 1990 Easter egg hunt with (front row, left to right) Drew Jennings, Ben Chartoff ’04, Nelson Schubart ’04, Mollie-Blair Delaney ’05, Hannah Robinson ’05, Legare Smith ’05, Whitney Smith ’03; (back row) Priscilla Parris ’01, Julia Wolfson ’02, Rebekah Weatherspoon ’01, Lisa Hardej ’01, Nick Curwen ’03, Noah Chartoff ’01 and Marian Spurrier.

Every generation of faculty children has engaged in its share of high jinks. Co Bennett ’60, son of the late George Bennett ’23, recalls the time two older fac brats “locked a friend and me in the janitor’s closet in the basement of Amen Hall. Then they put a firecracker in the lock and set it off.” Not only did the explosion terrify Bennett and his friend, but the door wouldn’t open.

Brown remembers “sneaking into the faculty locker room to use the sauna, riding skateboards on the off-limits gymnasium ramp and playing kick-the-can in the Amen quadrangle long after the preps had to check in. There were even a number of fledgling fac brat romances, but we all took a vow of secrecy on that; the last thing we wanted was our parents outlawing kick-the-can after dark.” Their antics continued well after sunset. “We used to dare each other to go out to the overgrown graveyard at midnight,” says Bennett, to visit an especially spooky coffin-shaped crypt.

For some youngsters, growing up at Exeter was as much a gastronomic as a social or academic experience. “I like to tell people that I grew up on cafeteria food,” says Mahoney, fond of the dining halls in his formative years. “I remember looking forward to Sunday brunch every week.” Marceny (Deardorff) Bourne ’87, daughter of Charles Deardorff, the emeritus chair of the modern languages department, had it even better. “One student used to come to our apartment in Webster on Sunday mornings and make crêpes,” Bourne says.