Annie Wright School - Shield Yearbook (Tacoma, WA)

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4% Bishop Huston The Reverend Canon Arthur Bell Gradually the new school assumed its present dignity with ivy-covered walls and grounds landscaped with shruhs and trees given by each graduating class. By 1935, the Golden Anniversary year, a girl might follow a strictly college preparatory course or a more general one, developed to fit the needs of those not interested in continuing their formal training. The physical education program offered a variety of sports, including tennis, golf, riding, swimming, basketball, hockey, and skiing. That same year an outdoor pageant, The Masque of the Golden Age, was produced by students, faculty, and alumnae. Through song, dance, and story, the life and spirit of the Seminary ' s fifty years were revealed, and even a briefly-suffered rainstorm could not destroy its grandeur. Decreased enrollment in the 1930 ' s and increased expenses during the early years of the Second World War forced the school to go deeply into debt. One fateful winter day in 1943, foreclosure of the mortgage was threatened. The Right Reverend S. Arthur Huston, President of the Board of Trustees, Miss Ruth Jenkins, newly-appointed headmistress, and the Board itself were given 48 hours in which to raise enough money to pay the most pressing obligations. Faith in and loyalty to the school prompted a wonderful response to a plea for aid from friends, alumnae and students. The crisis was averted. The debts were cancelled gradually. In 1947 the Right Reverend Stephen F. Bayne Jr. assumed the duties of President of the Board of Trustees. In November of 1954 a development program under the leadership of Miss Jenkins was initiated. With suffi- cient funds raised, ground was broken in January. 1957, for a wing to house class- rooms, an assembly hall, and a dance studio. The autumn of the same year saw the opening of the Charles Wright Academy in the Lakewood area, and the boys moved from their one-room school house on the Seminary grounds. A second ground-breaking in April of 1959 was attended by the Most Reverend Arthur Lichtenberger, Presiding Bishop of the Episcopal Church in the United States. The present plans for expansion will be realized with the completion of this library wing. 1958-59 has been the Seminary ' s Diamond Jubilee. Students, parents, alumnae, faculty, and friends of the school have joined together to make this year, pictorial ly represented in this twenty-eighth Shield, a tribute to seventy-five years of labor and of achievement. They have done so with the certain knowledge that in the strength of the past and present lies even greater strength for the future. Mrs. Thomas P. Harney, daughter of Annie Wright, was the commencement t Bishop Keator Mrs. Harney Bayne,

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FROM STRENGTH TO STRENGTH In the spring of 1881, the Right Reverend John Adams Paddock and his family traveled to the Pacific Northwest from Brooklyn, New York. After his establishment as leader of the newly created Missionary District of Washington Territory, the Bishop spoke of his hopes to supplement the educational facilities of the area. When Charles B. Wricht of Philadelphia, President of the Northern Pacific Railroad and of the Tacoma Land Company, heard of Bishop Paddock ' s plan to found a school, he offered three land tracts in Tacoma and fifty thousand dollars. Bishop Paddock raised a necessary twenty-five thousand more by contacting many of his friends in the East. Construction of a building on the outskirts of Tacoma at the corner of Tacoma and Division Avenues began in the late spring of 1884. That summer Bishop Paddock, Mr. Wright, and his daughter, Annie, in whose honor the Seminary was named, were present for the laying of the cornerstone. Soon the Reverend and Mrs. Lemuel H. Wells arrived, she to be the principal of the Annie Wright Seminary and he to become rector of St. Luke s Church, which was built at the same time. Included on the new faculty was Mrs. Amanda Whittlesley Raynor, beloved vice-principal of the school for twenty-three years. In the fall of 1884 the doors were opened to ninety-three girls from Washington, Oregon, and British Columbia, and to one who had spent nearly a month coming by wagon train from Alaska. They came, according to the first catalogue, to have not only the intellect but also the character, manners, and morals of the pupil developed. This catalogue also extolled the virtues of the English, French, German, Latin, Music and Drawing facilities, and it stated that the Art Department gives a rare opportunity to persons wishing to study . . . decoration on china, plush, and velvet. The tuition for the year was three hundred dollars for each boarding student plus thirty dollars for modern language study. The years passed, but the ideals of the Seminary remained constant. To the Right Reverend Frederic W. Keator, Bishop of Olympia, 1902-1924, the school seemed to be a real home where [the girls] would make lasting friendships and learn truths that would help them to build characters of real worth. The Board of Trustees realized in 1924 that if the Seminary were to fulfill its ideals and continue to give the best opportunities to the students, a larger building was necessary. Bishop Keator and Miss Adelaide B. Preston, headmistress of the time, led the drive for money to erect a new building a few blocks west on Tacoma Avenue. In September, 1924, the enlarged Annie Wright Seminary, including Raynor Chapel, named in memory of the first vice- principal, opened. Its ten-acre grounds furnished space for a hockey held, tennis courts, and extensive lawns. The Seminary, 1884

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Hail to thee, our Alma Mater, Seminary fair; May achievements crown thy labors is our earnest prayer. Deep and true as those blue waters thou art reared above, May the characters thou moldest hold thee in their love. Pure as yonder snow-clad mountains where our glances fall, May we in the years to follow answer to thy call. Chorus: Hearts turned toward our Alma Mater, may our lives at length Prove thy daughters bear thy motto, On from strength to strength.