A bit of Keith-related news

If memory serves, KO attended Hackley but graduated from a high school in New Jersey. Or maybe vice versa.

It sounds like they lost some beautiful buildings. Very unfortunate.

Lightning strike sparks fire at Tarrytown’s Hackley School, destroys library
By Rebecca Baker
The Journal News
(Original Publication: August 4, 2007)

Tarrytown - A lightning strike sometime around 3 a.m. is believed to have caused a major fire at the Hackley School that destroyed its historic stone library and severely damaged the rectory and church next door. The flames from the blaze were visible to drivers on Interstate 287 who called in the fire to Tarrytown police.

Some 100 firefighters from a dozen departments from all over central and northern Westchester fought the fire, containing it to those three buildings and saving the school’s main classrooms and a host of other structures from being destroyed.

“It was a helluva an effort,” Johnny Jackson, Westchester County’s deputy emergency services commissioner, said of firefighters’ battle to keep the flames from spreading. “The guys took a beating inside.”

There were no injuries reported as of 10 a.m. but the loss of property to the Benedict Avenue campus of the private prep school was significant. While the old stone facade of the Kaskel Library, once known as Goodhue Hall, survived, the roof, the interior and virtually all of its contents were decimated.

“The whole building was fully engulfed,” said Patrick Derivan, first assistant chief for the Tarrytown Fire Department who was among the first on the scene in the predawn hours.

Some five hours later, firefighters still swarmed the campus, their gear tossed about on its rolling lawns. Food and bottled water were being provided to relieve the oppressive heat and an air-conditioned county bus was brought to the scene so emergency responders could cool off if only for a few minutes.

A school’s spokeswoman said headmaster Walter Johnson, who was on the scene, was dealing with the immediacy of the fire but had scheduled a 2:30 press conference this afternoon to update the media.

The buildings either lost or damaged in the blaze, including King Chapel, are among the first visitors see as they come up the campus’ main drive. They date to the turn of the century and were part of the circa-1899 school’s first expansion. Hackley was originally the summer estate of Francis Brewster who donated her property to create a progressive Unitarian prep school that would be an alternative to the Northeast’s mostly Episcopal boys’ boarding schools, according to Wikipedia.

The school is now non-sectarian and co-educational, educating students in grades K-12 in a Lower School, Middle School and Upper School structure.

Read more about this story later on Lohud.com and tomorrow in The Journal News