| Windsor Mountain School | |
|---|---|
| Location | |
| Lenox, Massachusetts |
|
| Information | |
| Type | high school |
| Established | 1944 |
| Enrollment | c.250 |
| Color(s) | no uniform |
The Windsor Mountain School was a coeducational boarding high school in Lenox, Massachusetts.
The school was established in Lenox in 1944 by German Jewish educational reformer Max Bondy and his wife Gertrude Bondy.[1][2] The Bondys had earlier established an international school in Germany, initially in Gandersheim and later in Marienau.[3][4] When the rise of Nazism threatened their enterprise, they left Germany, re-establishing their school in Switzerland in 1937.[3] In 1939 they moved to the United States, reopening their school in Windsor, Vermont, and then later in Manchester, Vermont at the site of the Wilburton Inn, before moving it to Massachusetts.[5]
In 1951, after Max Bondy's death, his son Heinz succeeded him as headmaster.[6] Heinz Bondy led the school for 25 years until it closed in the mid-1970s.[7]
Operated according to progressive education principles, the school was unusually democratic in its governance, with a student government that was empowered to make all nonacademic rules. As of 1970, there was no dress code, student publications were not censored, and there were no restrictions on student political activities. The school's philosophy held that the exercise of freedom would help students become responsible, self-directing people.[6]
Among the prominent Americans who sent their children to Windsor Mountain School in the 1960s were musicians Harry Belafonte, Thelonious Monk, and Randy Weston[8] and civil rights lawyer Clifford Durr and his wife, activist Virginia Foster Durr.[9]
As of 1970, Windsor Mountain had about 250 students, including about 40 African Americans.[6]
Educator Hans Maeder, who was later to establish and lead the Stockbridge School, taught at Windsor Mountain School for a year in the 1940s. Poet Gerald Hausman taught at Windsor Mountain School from 1969 to 1976.[10]