English High School’s 50th reunion for the class of 1964 is being held today, Nov. 14, at the school’s current home in Jamaica Plain. An all-classes homecoming reunion was scheduled to be held yesterday, after the Gazette’s deadline.
Frank Williams, who is on English’s (EHS) Board of Directors and a 1967 alumnus, told the Gazette that the board is “committed to making sure the school stays as viable today as it was in the past.”
One of the oldest continuously public high school in the country, EHS was founded in 1821 behind the State House. In the 1950s, it was moved to Avenue Louis Pasteur in the Longwood Medical Area before moving again, to JP, in the 1980s, Williams said.
It was, in fact, a neighbor of the Boston Latin School for about 80 years—and its student population reflected that fact.
“When people flunked out of Latin, they went to English,” he said.
That was still a high bar—EHS was still an all-boys’ exam school at the time, Williams explained. Curricula might have included military science classes—instituted after World War II and maintained through the early 1960s—or more orthodox yearbook or drama.
Williams himself fondly remembers participating in yearbook, the drama club and in various sports.
Though he told the Gazette his favorite thing about attending was the “camaraderie with the faculty” and participating in the Schoolboy Parade at White Stadium in Franklin Park.
Registration for today’s reunion begins at 3 p.m. at English High School, 144 McBride St. in JP. For tickets and more information, call 617-538-1737.