Any report of the 1998-1999 year in the history of Deerfield must begin with the rather simple observation that we completed the celebration of our Bicentennial in fine style, and that one of the best ways we did that was to enjoy another very successful school year. No one will ever forget the magnificent occasion a year ago-in October, 1998-the fireworks, the dancing, all the seminars, the fellowship across generations, and the stirring procession of returning alumni and faculty into the great tent, to the unrelenting ovation of faculty and students, and concluding with the greatest applause of all, when Meera Viswanathan, holding a sign that said "The Grandes Dames," led through all the well-wishers those redoubtable women of Deerfield: Evelyn Boyden, Kitty Hunt, Mimi Miller, and Kottie Williams. Last October we also dedicated our two splendid new dormitories, John Louis and Louis Marx, in a twilight ceremony-this time under a slightly smaller tent in what we now call the "New Quadrangle" on the eastern side of campus-and we listened intently to two very moving presentations by Louis Marx, Jr. '49 and Jeffry Louis '81. I thought to myself at the time, that even as I continue the tradition of telling our graduating seniors the Tom Ashley story, reminding them at the end that it all comes down to loyalty, the examples of loyalty to Deerfield are all around us all the time in a more manifest way. To be the present headmaster of Deerfield, and in a sense, caught in the middle of all of this, is an extraordinarily humbling experience.

What do we try to do in return? How do we show our appreciation for what past generations have done for us? Or for the past itself? One way of answering these questions is to say that, amid all that is new at Deerfield and forward-looking, we remain committed preservationists. It is important to us that the campus has the same feel that it has always had, or that a walk down Albany Road today will generate thoughts and impressions that would be quite familiar to those of us who come from earlier times. Indeed, by an accident of history, it happens that not only the headmaster, but also the business manager, the director of our physical plant, and our director of grounds are all Deerfield graduates. And while the new buildings have been built this year, we have also invested aggressively in the preservation of our old ones. The John Williams House was completely rehabilitated in the summer of 1998, becoming-ironically-our newest, oldest dormitory, and now the Ephraim Williams House, our new Faculty and Alumni Center, has been restored inside and out, so that it stands as proudly as it did on the day it was built almost 250 years ago. The project to save Chapin House has been the most ambitious and the most expensive, but we have done it through the great generosity of Deerfield alumni and the Brown Foundation in Houston. For the second time in its life Chapin was moved, this time to take it out of the center of the New Quadrangle and position it across Academy Lane to the south, and then basically to reconstruct it so that it now handsomely serves its new purpose as the center for our community service activities.

Of course we also endeavor to show our appreciation by simply doing everything we can to sustain our enviable place in American independent secondary education. When the 50th reunion class returned to Deerfield last June, even as they were catching up with one another, they very much wanted to hear about everything that is going on at Deerfield today. We did our best to tell all the ways we are continuing to provide for our present students the best education that can be obtained anywhere.

To show their appreciation, at the general meeting of the alumni on Saturday morning, June 12, the Class of 1949 presented the academy with a check for $15,000,000. It was by far the largest gift ever made to Deerfield by a reunion class. I was quite speechless then, and I still don't know how I could ever thank them adequately for what they have done for their school. While I think of how we can be faithful to our past, it is really they-our Class of 1949, and all Deerfield classes for all time-who have shown us what loyalty really means.