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Former Alexandria student dies in Arizona
Last edited Mon Aug 27, 2018, 05:04 PM - Edit history (1)
John McCain, True to His School
Episcopal High Alums Give a Former Classmate High Marks
By Ken Ringle
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, December 6, 1999; Page C01
To fully gauge the dimensions of Sen. John McCain's presidential fund-raiser yesterday, you had to remember Episcopal High School when McCain went there in the 1950s--the sagging pipe-frame bunks, the cold fried eggs, the caged adolescent pressures and fierce pride that made the then all-male boarding school a bizarre boot camp of the mind and soul.
You needed to remember the seedy antiquity and genteel arrogance of the place, the cruelty and brotherhood of shared incarceration; the inspired hilarity and the tortured loneliness and the night the cockroach population reached Malthusian flash point and marched en masse on Blackford Hall where McCain lived. ... They were the same sickly brown as the ancient linoleum. The entire dorm floor was moving. ... Episcopal, McCain has said, may have been the closest thing to a proper prep school for his years of imprisonment in Hanoi. ... "I'm a victim of Episcopal High School," he told the 60-odd classmates and alumni of the Alexandria prep school who turned out for a $250- to $1,000-a-plate brunch at the Ritz-Carlton Pentagon City. "The principles embodied in the school, and especially in its honor code, are those I've tried to embody in my own life. I haven't always succeeded . . . but I've tried."
....
McCain's competitive passion at EHS was best remembered by those present yesterday in terms of his wrestling career, which saw him win his high school letter in his first year--a highly unusual achievement--and later hold for two years the school record for speed in pinning opponents. Invitations to the event arrived complete with the official photo of the 1954 EHS wrestling team and the caption, "Do you recognize the presidential candidate?"
....
Those of us assigned as rats to periodically wake up McCain and his dorm mates can report that the future presidential candidate slept in his underwear and always specified that he be awakened at absolutely the last minute before the last bell summoning students to breakfast. ... He was famously incorrigible, mocking the school's coat-and-tie traditions with a decaying sport coat and fetid black knit tie worn with Levis and motorcycle boots. Equally disdainful of school rules, he was wont to "skip off" for after-hours adventures in Washington involving, at the very least, cigarettes and beer. His senior class picture shows the future scourge of big tobacco dangling a cigarette from his mouth, overcoated against the weather in "Burma," a forbidden off-campus hideaway in the woods across Quaker Lane. ... In a culture of raging testosterone, where a posture of studied toughness was both cultivated and mocked, McCain was elected during his senior year in the annual yearbook poll as runner-up for "thinks he's hardest." The previous year, he had been runner-up for sloppiest; the year before that, runner-up for "freshest rat."
....
© Copyright 1999 The Washington Post Company
Episcopal High Alums Give a Former Classmate High Marks
By Ken Ringle
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, December 6, 1999; Page C01
To fully gauge the dimensions of Sen. John McCain's presidential fund-raiser yesterday, you had to remember Episcopal High School when McCain went there in the 1950s--the sagging pipe-frame bunks, the cold fried eggs, the caged adolescent pressures and fierce pride that made the then all-male boarding school a bizarre boot camp of the mind and soul.
You needed to remember the seedy antiquity and genteel arrogance of the place, the cruelty and brotherhood of shared incarceration; the inspired hilarity and the tortured loneliness and the night the cockroach population reached Malthusian flash point and marched en masse on Blackford Hall where McCain lived. ... They were the same sickly brown as the ancient linoleum. The entire dorm floor was moving. ... Episcopal, McCain has said, may have been the closest thing to a proper prep school for his years of imprisonment in Hanoi. ... "I'm a victim of Episcopal High School," he told the 60-odd classmates and alumni of the Alexandria prep school who turned out for a $250- to $1,000-a-plate brunch at the Ritz-Carlton Pentagon City. "The principles embodied in the school, and especially in its honor code, are those I've tried to embody in my own life. I haven't always succeeded . . . but I've tried."
....
McCain's competitive passion at EHS was best remembered by those present yesterday in terms of his wrestling career, which saw him win his high school letter in his first year--a highly unusual achievement--and later hold for two years the school record for speed in pinning opponents. Invitations to the event arrived complete with the official photo of the 1954 EHS wrestling team and the caption, "Do you recognize the presidential candidate?"
....
Those of us assigned as rats to periodically wake up McCain and his dorm mates can report that the future presidential candidate slept in his underwear and always specified that he be awakened at absolutely the last minute before the last bell summoning students to breakfast. ... He was famously incorrigible, mocking the school's coat-and-tie traditions with a decaying sport coat and fetid black knit tie worn with Levis and motorcycle boots. Equally disdainful of school rules, he was wont to "skip off" for after-hours adventures in Washington involving, at the very least, cigarettes and beer. His senior class picture shows the future scourge of big tobacco dangling a cigarette from his mouth, overcoated against the weather in "Burma," a forbidden off-campus hideaway in the woods across Quaker Lane. ... In a culture of raging testosterone, where a posture of studied toughness was both cultivated and mocked, McCain was elected during his senior year in the annual yearbook poll as runner-up for "thinks he's hardest." The previous year, he had been runner-up for sloppiest; the year before that, runner-up for "freshest rat."
....
© Copyright 1999 The Washington Post Company
John McCain '54: 1936 - 2018
Posted: 8/25/2018
(Updated 8/26, 9:28 p.m. ET) The Hon. Sen. John Sidney McCain III ’54 died Saturday, August 25, 2018. He was 81.
....
As a three-year student at Episcopal, Senator McCain was a talented athlete who played football, wrestling, and tennis. As a senior, he wrestled in the 127-pound weight class and held the record for “fastest pin” for two years. He also served on the staff of The Chronicle (newspaper) and Whispers (yearbook), Dramatics Club, E Club, Missionary Society, and Blackford Literary Society, among others. ... At the time, the student body was 240 boys and 22 faculty members, and the annual tuition was $1,400. The School observed a Sunday and Monday weekend, rather than Saturday and Sunday.
The EHS Honor Code, which is one of the oldest among secondary schools, was as important to student life in the 1950s as it is today. When asked what about his Episcopal experience had the greatest impact on his life, the Senator once responded in a visit to the School community in 2008, “My exposure to the Honor Code, which has guided me throughout my life.” (Full transcript of McCain's 2008 speech at Episcopal High School available here.)
Senator McCain kept close ties to the School over the decades. In “Faith of My Fathers,” a memoir published in 1999, the Senator described fond memories of his years at Episcopal and the confidence he gained from his experience and teachers, particularly English teacher William B. Ravenel, about whom he wrote: “Were William B. Ravenel the only person I remember from high school, I would credit those days as among the best of my life.”
In 1987, the Senator received the Distinguished Alumnus Award. In 2001, the School presented Senator McCain with the Phillips Integrity in Action Award, “recognizing his life of service, which epitomizes the highest ideals of honor and integrity – values that are at the core of Episcopal High School,” then-Headmaster Rob Hershey wrote at the time.
Posted: 8/25/2018
(Updated 8/26, 9:28 p.m. ET) The Hon. Sen. John Sidney McCain III ’54 died Saturday, August 25, 2018. He was 81.
....
As a three-year student at Episcopal, Senator McCain was a talented athlete who played football, wrestling, and tennis. As a senior, he wrestled in the 127-pound weight class and held the record for “fastest pin” for two years. He also served on the staff of The Chronicle (newspaper) and Whispers (yearbook), Dramatics Club, E Club, Missionary Society, and Blackford Literary Society, among others. ... At the time, the student body was 240 boys and 22 faculty members, and the annual tuition was $1,400. The School observed a Sunday and Monday weekend, rather than Saturday and Sunday.
The EHS Honor Code, which is one of the oldest among secondary schools, was as important to student life in the 1950s as it is today. When asked what about his Episcopal experience had the greatest impact on his life, the Senator once responded in a visit to the School community in 2008, “My exposure to the Honor Code, which has guided me throughout my life.” (Full transcript of McCain's 2008 speech at Episcopal High School available here.)
Senator McCain kept close ties to the School over the decades. In “Faith of My Fathers,” a memoir published in 1999, the Senator described fond memories of his years at Episcopal and the confidence he gained from his experience and teachers, particularly English teacher William B. Ravenel, about whom he wrote: “Were William B. Ravenel the only person I remember from high school, I would credit those days as among the best of my life.”
In 1987, the Senator received the Distinguished Alumnus Award. In 2001, the School presented Senator McCain with the Phillips Integrity in Action Award, “recognizing his life of service, which epitomizes the highest ideals of honor and integrity – values that are at the core of Episcopal High School,” then-Headmaster Rob Hershey wrote at the time.
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