Senior Master Ed Small Retires After 45 Years at Gunn

On June 10, Ed Small, the Anne S. and Ogden D. Miller Senior Master, retired after 45 years of teaching, coaching, dorm parenting, and advising at The Frederick Gunn School.

A graduate of Bowdoin College, Small joined the faculty in the fall of 1977. He, Pamela Taylor, and Hugh Caldara were among 15 new teachers that year, and their start coincided with the arrival of the first class to include female students since 1921. Small arrived with his wife, Peg, who served as School Registrar from July 1978 until her retirement in 2021.

“Ed has been an integral part of our community for more than four decades,” said Head of School Peter Becker. “He and Peg have impacted the lives of countless Gunn students. Please join me in congratulating Ed on an epic teaching career and thanking him for his friendship and colleagueship over so many years.”

During their tenure, the Smalls served under four different Heads of School and contributed to every facet of life at school.

“Ed Small anchored the faculty during my tenure as Head of School,” said Susan Graham H’12. “A long-haul loyalist, Ed identified himself from the beginning as a steadfast utility player, capable of shouldering multiple roles with competence. Without questioning, he would step forward to take on an extra section of PreCalculus, to coach a third term sport, to fill in for a colleague on weekend team or dorm duty.”

“Ed brought many skills to the school over his four decades but underlying all is his deep and abiding belief in the personal and academic potential of every student,” said former Head of School Michael Eanes H’90 P’90 GP’20 ’23 ’25. “In his own, sometimes taciturn (Maine!) way, he brought out the best in his math students, his athletes, and particularly his advisees. It is a testimony to his effectiveness as the quintessential boarding school teacher/coach/ advisor that so many alumni have stayed in touch with him.”

As the parent of an alumna and a Gunn grandparent, Eanes noted Small has always been a favorite of faculty children — and campus canines. “Susan H’91 P’90 GP’20 ’23 ’25 and I are so grateful that our daughter, Laura Eanes Martin ’90 P’20 ’23 ’25, and two of our grandchildren, Luke Martin ’23 and Amelia Martin ’25, have had the privilege of being his students,” Eanes said. “We wish him all the best as he embarks on his next chapter, a well-deserved retirement.”

As a teacher, Small taught some 15 different math courses, served as advisor to the Mathletes, created the curriculum for the Operations Research course, and has been the only faculty member to teach it. Outside of the classroom, he wrote a computer program to maintain the school’s academic course schedule, he was a member of the Curriculum Committee and the Disciplinary Committee. As Head of the Mathematics Department, he hired Alisa Croft, who eventually succeeded him as Mathematics Department Chair.

“When I think about Ed, a smile comes across my face, and I imagine countless other students and colleagues have this same reaction when hearing Ed’s name,” said Croft, who also coached Girls Varsity Soccer with Ed. “For me, this smile comes from the years that he made me feel like family on The Frederick Gunn School campus, and from the hours spent together discussing lots of life and school experiences. It is my hope to smile brightly in the coming years every time I think of all those lessons I have learned from Ed.”

As dorm parents, the Smalls lived in eight different dorms, including Emerson from 1977 to 1983. They raised two sons on campus, Tyler and Brett, and are beloved by generations of Gunn alumni who as students sought their advice, encouragement, and support.

“Patrick Baker ’89 used to study in our house at the kitchen table,” Ed Small said, recalling that Scott Schwind ’89, Alexa Hockens Knight ’89, and Silvia Mayo Molina ’89 also visited when they needed a quiet place, or some of Peg’s homemade peanut butter squares, popcorn, or chocolate chip cookies. “There was a time they used to come over at 10 p.m. to watch ‘Thirty Something,’ then go back to the dorm.”

Over the course of four decades, Small coached about 10 different athletic teams, and up until 2012, coached teams in all three seasons. He was the Assistant Coach for Varsity Football with Hugh Caldara, his close friend and colleague for 37 years at Gunn. Small was an assistant coach for Varsity Cross Country and Varsity Baseball, serving alongside Assistant Coach Richard Martin P’20 ’23 ’25 and the David N. Hoadley ’51 Baseball Coach, Jeff Trundy.

“Whether in the classroom, coaching baseball or another sport, or planning graduation, Ed gave so much to kids. I think a lot of his lessons became very valuable to kids as they moved forward in life,” said Trundy, who traveled with Martin and Ed and Peg Small on the baseball team’s annual spring trip to Florida in March. “It was always a great time in Florida. Ed loved going to spring training games. I’m happy for him and Peg. We’re all going to miss them. His contributions to the school are immeasurable.”

In 2014, following the retirement of Russ Elgin, Small took up the mantle of Senior Master from his longtime friend and colleague. Small had the arduous job of moving the Commencement ceremony from the Meeting House on the Green (with traditions first established in 1924) to the tent on Edward Wersebe Memorial Field, a necessary step to accommodate the whole school and the increasing number of family members who wished to attend. “I liked designing it. I think we did a good job moving it from the church down to the tent,” Small reflected this summer.

The Class of 2017 was the first to graduate in the new location, and that same year, through a gift from Dwight Miller ’55 in the name of his parents, Small was named the first Anne S. and Ogden D. Miller Senior Master. In this role, Small carried the Gunn Mace with pride and grace and delivered the invocation and benediction at annual events from Convocation to Investiture, invoking a blessing upon students and faculty at the beginning and end of every school year.

Elgin still remembers the first time he met Small, in the fall of 1976. Elgin was then Head Coach for Varsity Cross Country at Gunn, and Small was in the same role at Hopkins School. “We had a meet on a Saturday in New Haven. It was not a nice day. It was windy, cloudy, and it started to rain. I never in my life heard of a cross country race being canceled, and I think Ed thought the same way. Half their course was underwater, but still we ran the race. Come to find out, we were actually in a hurricane right then. But we did it.”

When Ed arrived at Gunn, they became friends. They served on the Curriculum Committee together, coached cross country together for a few years, and baseball for 16 years, and after Emerson was expanded, served as dorm parents together for a year. “During my time at the school, I don’t think anybody was a better advisor than Ed was,” Elgin recalled. “He was very attached to his advisees’ successes and helping them when they had problems. He did a wonderful job like that, being an advisor.”

>>> Leading the Way

Frederick Gunn was a well-known and influential leader, and leadership is something we take seriously at our school. Every student here has an opportunity to take on a leadership role. Students can lead collaborative projects in the classroom, guide prospective students and families on campus tours, or seek an appointed or elected role. We are pleased to introduce some of our student leaders for the 2022-23 school year, and we celebrate everyone in our community who finds a way to become involved and to lead.

2022-23 Prefects

This year’s prefects see themselves as leaders who work as a team; who serve as a bridge between the student body and faculty; who encourage community connection and collaboration; who inspire others and encourage peers to step out of their comfort zone; who help others find their place at the school and the leader in themselves; who are there for others on their best and worst days; and who will ignite positive change.

On Senior Rock (left to right): Prefects Viv Boucher ’23, Ashleen Hay ’23 (Head Prefect), Chris Wang ’23, Hunter Fonseca ’23, Maeren Hay ’23, Will Marich ’23, Alex Johnson ’23, and Emily Chiappa ’23

Gunn Society Leaders

The Gunn Society’s mission is to stimulate connections between current Gunn students and alumni and to prepare students for their future roles as ambassadors for The Frederick Gunn School.

Head Tour Guides

Our Head Tour Guides are ambassadors for the school and support the work of the Admissions Office. They are often among the first people prospective students and parents meet when they visit campus, and set an example for all tour guides to follow.

2022-23 Gunn Scholars

The Gunn Scholar program is an endowed program that offers selected students opportunities to pursue a topic of their choosing in the Paula and George Krimsky Archives and Special Collections as part of a yearlong research project in their senior year. Introduced at Prize Night, this year’s Gunn Scholars — Georgie Charette ’23, Holli Hay ’23, Sidney Mutau ’23, and Gloria Wang ’23 — began working this fall to outline the scope of their thesis, develop a written proposal, and work diligently within the school’s archives, exploring the mission and vision of Frederick W. Gunn through primary-source research and place-based learning.