Townsend Harris Hall Prep School

Townsend Harris Hall Prep School was a public preparatory school located in Manhattan in New York City.

The original building on 23rd Street, known as the Lawrence and Eris Field Building, is still in use today.
Townsend Harris Hall School
Address
141 Convent Avenue

Manhattan, NY
,
New York
10031

United States
Coordinates40°49′10″N 73°57′00″W
Information
TypePublic (magnet) secondary
Established1849
Grades10–12
Enrollment1108
Color(s)Crimson and gold
MascotHawks
NewspaperThe Classic
The Phoenix
YearbookThe Crimson and Gold

History

The school was named for Townsend Harris who, besides his many diplomatic accomplishments, had helped found the Free Academy of the City of New York, later to become City College, and who was a strong proponent of free education. Townsend Harris was formed in 1849 as a one-year preparatory school for CUNY.[1] The Free Academy's introductory year gradually evolved and in 1904 became a fully-fledged 3-year high school in the East Side Manhattan neighborhood of Kips Bay.[2] The school occupied a spartan campus on the 9th to 12th floors of a building at 23rd Street and Lexington Avenue that now houses CUNY's Baruch College.[3] It moved to Harlem in 1906.[1] In 1930 as a result of overcrowding, the school moved back to 23rd St.[1] The school operated as an All Boys School for its duration.[4] Townsend Harris had a significant amount of Jewish and Eastern European students.[5] Most students were ready to graduate by the age of 15 or 16.[5]

Townsend Harris Hall houses the CUNY School of Medicine. Designed by famed New York architect George B. Post and completed in 1908, the Collegiate Gothic-style building is named for Townsend Harris, the founder of City College, and was dedicated in a ceremony at which Mark Twain was the featured speaker.

Academics

The school admitted students by entrance examination.[2] Those who graduated from Townsend Harris were guaranteed a place at City College.[1][6] Townsend Harris condensed four years of high school into three.[6] At its time, it was considered to be NYC's most prestigious examination school.[7] The school eventually gained a reputation as being elitist and obsolete.[8]

Closing

This original incarnation, known as Townsend Harris Hall, survived until 1942, when it was closed by mayor Fiorello La Guardia for budgetary reasons.[9] However, newspapers speculated that it was closed because a relative of Mayor Laguardia was not admitted to the school.[10] New York City eliminated 75 teachers and 1000 students with its closing.[5] Townsend Harris closed with about 10,000 graduates.[11] In 1980, a group of alumni from Townsend Harris Hall took on a mission to reopen the school. In 1984 a school, associated with Queens College, was opened in Queens, NY, and took on the similar name of Townsend Harris High School.

Notable alumni

Scholars

Science and technology

Writing and journalism

Performing arts and entertainment

Business, economics, and philanthropy

Law, politics, and activism

References
  1. Weiss, Samuel (June 10, 1985). "THE NEW TOWNSEND HARRIS HIGH KEEPS OLD GOALS". New York Times.
  2. "Why some schools rocket to the top". New York Post. September 9, 2012.
  3. "Summer 2005 Townsend Harris Alumni Magazine" (PDF). 2007-08-11. p. 10. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2007-08-11.
  4. Jonas Salk: A Life. Oxford University Press. 21 April 2015. ISBN 978-0-19-933443-8.
  5. Shepard, Richard F. (December 7, 1973). "30 Alumni of Townsend Harris High Recall Glory Years as Elite Scholars". New York Times.
  6. The Aristocracy of Talent: How Meritocracy Made the Modern World. Simon and Schuster. 13 July 2021. ISBN 9781510768628.
  7. Krasner, Jonathan B. (January 2012). The Benderly Boys and American Jewish Education. ISBN 9781611682939.
  8. "The Original Elite High School in New York City: Townsend Harris Hall – Baruch College Archives and Special Collections".
  9. "Townsend Harris HS Alumni Association".
  10. Trapasso, Clare. "Townsend Harris High School: A real gem in Queens". New York Daily News.
  11. "Townsend Harris HS Alumni Association". thaa.org.
  12. "Donald M. Friedman". senate.universityofcalifornia.edu. Retrieved 2022-05-27.
  13. Roberts, Sam. "Morton Deutsch, Expert on Conflict Resolution, Dies at 97", The New York Times, March 21, 2017. Accessed March 23, 2017. "Raised in the Washington Heights section of Manhattan, he read Freud and Marx when he was 10, graduated from Townsend Harris Hall and entered City College when he was 15 planning to become a psychiatrist."
  14. James, Laylin K., ed. (1995), Nobel laureates in chemistry, 1901-1992 (3rd ed.), American Chemical Society and Chemical Heritage Foundation, ISBN 0-8412-2459-5, (p. 674) Born ... in New York City, Hauptman received his early education there, graduating from Townsend Harris High School.
  15. Lebow, Eileen F. (2000), "The bright boys: a history of Townsend Harris High School", Contributions to the Study of Education, Westport, CT, USA: Greenwood Press, ISBN 0-313-31479-9, ISSN 0196-707X, (p. 21) A comparison of the two sets of grades indicates the intensity of scholarship that became a Townsend Harris trademark ... Future physicist William Nierenberg, Class of 1935, garnered five 100s ... Future Nobel Laureate Herbert Hauptman had three 100s ...
  16. "Robert Jastrow: Astronomer, cosmologist, physicist, and space scientist who was a well-known advocate of NASA", The Times (UK), 28 March 2008, retrieved 2 January 2011, Jastrow was born in 1925 in New York City. He attended the Townsend Harris High School, Flushing, New York, and went on to study physics at Columbia University
  17. Schiffer, John; Charles Johnson (16 May 2007). "Death notice: Gilbert Jerome Perlow". obituary. Physics Today. Archived from the original on 24 July 2008. Retrieved 2 January 2011. Gilbert Perlow, one of the pioneers of the Mössbauer effect and an editor of the Journal of Applied Physics and Applied Physics Letters ... He attended Townsend Harris Hall (now Townsend Harris High School) in Queens
  18. Naden, Corinne J.; Blue, Rose (2001), Jonas Salk: Polio Pioneer, Brookfield, CT, USA: Millbrook Press, Inc., ISBN 0-7613-1804-6, (p. 12) Twelve-year-old Jonas Salk passed the test and entered Townsend Harris High School in 1926. When he graduated three years later, he was not quite 15 ...
  19. Schmeck Jr., Harold M. (24 June 1995), "Dr. Jonas Salk, Whose Vaccine Turned Tide on Polio, Dies at 80", New York Times, retrieved 1 January 2011, The family lived in the Bronx, where Jonas went to grade school, then to the Townsend Harris High School for exceptionally promising students.
  20. Roff, Sandra Shoiock; Cucchiara, Anthony M. (2000), From the Free Academy to CUNY: illustrating public higher education in New York City, 1847-1997, New York, NY, USA: Fordham University Press, ISBN 0-8232-2019-2, (p. 19) Admission to Harris High was selective, and its graduates ... form a roster of high achievers. A few representative names are author Herman Wouk, actor Cornel Wilde, politician Adam Clayton Powell, lyricist Ira Gershwin, scientist Jonas Salk, news commentator David Schonbaum, and playwright Sidney Kingsley.
  21. Milton, Kimball A. (9 October 2006), Julian Schwinger: Nuclear Physics, the Radiation Laboratory, Renormalized QED, Source Theory, and Beyond (PDF), pp. 4–5, The Depression did mean that Julian would have to rely on free education, which New York well-provided in those days: A year or two at Townsend Harris High School, a public preparatory school feeding into City College, where Julian matriculated in 1933.
  22. Schweber, Silvan S. (1994), QED and the men who made it: Dyson, Feynman, Schwinger, and Tomonaga, Princeton, NJ, USA: Princeton University Press, ISBN 0-691-03685-3, (p.276) As Harold had done before him, Julian attended Townsend Harris.
  23. Levy, Leon; Linden, Eugene (2009-03-25). The Mind of Wall Street: A Legendary Financier on the Perils of Greed and the Mysteries of the Market. PublicAffairs. ISBN 978-0-7867-3015-5.
  24. Lagemann, Ellen Condliffe; Patricia A. Graham (1994). "Lawrence A. Cremin: A Biographical Memoir". Teachers College Record. New York, NY, USA: Columbia University. 96 (1): 102–113. doi:10.1177/016146819409600102. ISSN 0161-4681. S2CID 246703318. Lawrence Cremin was truly a giant among us. A man of boundless energy, ... Graduated from Townsend Harris at the age of fifteen and a half
  25. Fowler, Glenn (5 September 1990), "Obituary; Lawrence Cremin, 64, Educator And a Prize-Winning Historian", New York Times, p. 2, retrieved 1 January 2011, A native of Manhattan, Dr. Cremin was a graduate of Townsend Harris High School and of City College.
  26. Larrabee, Harold A.; Sterling P. Lamprecht (1954–1955). "Irwin Edman". Proceedings and Addresses of the American Philosophical Association. Newark, DE, USA: American Philosophical Association. 28: 60–62. ISSN 0065-972X. Irwin Edman was every inch a New Yorker, appropriately educated at the Townsend Harris High School for the exceptionally gifted.
  27. Widmer, Kingsley (1980). Paul Goodman. Boston: Twayne. p. 13. ISBN 0-8057-7292-8.
  28. Barnes, Mike (2015-10-08). "Hy Hollinger, Former THR Writer and International Editor, Dies at 97". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved 2015-11-07.
  29. "John F. Kieran – Society for American Baseball Research".
  30. Lebow, Eileen F. (2000), "The bright boys: a history of Townsend Harris High School", Contributions to the Study of Education, Westport, CT, USA: Greenwood Press, ISBN 0-313-31479-9, ISSN 0196-707X, (p. 137) ... affirming the school's unique role and listing distinguished alumni: among them Justice Felix Frankfurter, Senator Robert Wagner ... Sidney Kingsley, playwright; and Edward G. Robinson, actor.
  31. Fischer, Heinz Dietrich; Fischer, Erika J. (1998), The Pulitzer Prize Archive: Drama/comedy awards, 1917-1996: from Eugene O'Neill and Tennessee Williams to Richard Rodgers and Edward Albee, vol. 12, part 4, Bodenheim, FRG: WS-Druckerei Werner Schaubruch, ISBN 3-598-30170-7, (p. 71) Sidney Kingsley (born Sidney Kirshner ...) first attended public school on the Lower West Side and then Townsend Harris high school, graduating in 1924.
  32. Martin, Douglas (8 July 2006), "Anatole Shub, 78, a Researcher and Reporter on Russian Topics, Dies", New York Times, retrieved 2 January 2011, Mr. Shub attended Townsend Harris High School and then joined the Navy in 1945.
  33. Beichman, Arnold (2009) [2004], Herman Wouk: the novelist as social historian (2nd ed.), Piscatawway, NJ, USA: Transaction Publishers, ISBN 978-0-7658-0836-3, (p. 15) Wouk was the youngest of three children ... He attended Townsend Harris High School, an elite public school for high IQ New York youngsters ...
  34. Weber, Bruce (9 September 2009), "Army Archerd, Columnist for Variety, Dies at 87", New York Times, retrieved 1 January 2011, Armand André Archerd was born in New York City ... He attended Townsend Harris High School and City College of New York ...
  35. Saperstein, Pat (14 May 2008). "Warren Cowan dies at 87: PR maven "father of Hollywood press agents"". Variety. Retrieved 2 January 2011. Daily Variety columnist Army Archerd and Cowan became best friends when they were 12 ... Cowan was born in New York to songwriter Rubey Cowan and wife Grace and attended Townsend Harris High School with Archerd.
  36. Weber, Bruce (16 May 2008), "Warren Cowan, a Star at Promoting Stars, Dies at 87", New York Times, retrieved 2 January 2011, Warren Jay Cowan was born in New York City on March 13, 1921. His father, Rubey, was a songwriter. He went to Townsend Harris High School in Manhattan
  37. Bloom, Ken (2007), The Routledge guide to Broadway, New York, NY, USA: Routledge, ISBN 978-0-415-97380-9, (p. 58) Howard Dietz was born in New York ... He attended Townsend Harris Hall and Columbia University.
  38. "Ervin Drake". biographic sketch. Song Writers Hall of Fame. 2011. Archived from the original on 18 December 2010. Retrieved 1 January 2011. He was born Ervin Maurice Druckman in New York City on April 3, 1919. He attended Townsend Harris Hall, and then the City College of New York
  39. Pollack, Howard (2006), George Gershwin: his life and work, Berkeley, CA, USA: University of California Press, ISBN 978-0-520-24864-9, (p. 224) By 1916, Gershwin had also begun writing songs with Irving Caesar ... Caesar, a tunesmith in his own right, had grown up on the Lower East Side, and like Ira had graduated from Townsend Harris ...
  40. Bloom, Ken (2007), The Routledge guide to Broadway, New York, NY, USA: Routledge, ISBN 978-0-415-97380-9, (p. 106) E. Y. ("Yip") Harburg was perhaps Broadway's most complex lyricist ... He began as a lyricist while still at New York City's Townsend Harris Hall High School along with schoolmate Ira Gershwin
  41. Riley, Sam G. (1995), Biographical dictionary of American newspaper columnists, Westport, CT, USA: Greenwood Press, ISBN 0-313-29192-6, (pp. 129-130) Hellinger was born in New York City ad attended the city's public schools. He was expelled from Townsend Harris High School for organizing a student strike.
  42. Bloom, Ken (2007), The Routledge guide to Broadway, New York, NY, USA: Routledge, ISBN 978-0-415-97380-9, (p. 148) Frank Loesser was the most versatile of all Broadway composers ... He was educated at Townsend Harris Hall and dropped out of City College.
  43. Rodgers, Richard; Rodgers, Mary (2002) [1975], Musical Stages: An Autobiography (3rd ed.), Cambridge, MA, USA: Da Capo Press, ISBN 0-306-81134-0, (p. 18) This victory in part was responsible in part for my downfall at Townsend Harris, and started a pattern I was to follow for the rest of my scholastic life: I always devoted too much time to nonacademic matters.
  44. Hyland, William G. (1998), Richard Rodgers, New Haven, CT, USA: Yale University Press, ISBN 0-300-07115-9, Richard enrolled at the prestigious Townsend Harris Hall, a high school reserved for talented young boys ... Academic pursuits did not attract Rodgers, however, and he transferred to the more pedestrian De Witt Clinton High School
  45. Strouse, Charles (2008), Put on a Happy Face: A Broadway Memoir, New York, NY, USA: Sterling Publishing Co, Inc., ISBN 978-1-4027-5889-8, ... in 1943, at the age of fifteen, I graduated from the academically prestigious Townsend Harris Hall ... Alumni included Richard Rodgers, Richard Loesser, Ira Gershwin, E. Y. Harburg, and actors Clifton Webb and E. G. Robinson.
  46. Rothstein, Mervyn (1 September 2009). "A Life in the Theatre: Charles Strouse". interview. Playbill.com. Archived from the original on 2 March 2010. Retrieved 2 January 2010. I went to P.S. 87 and Townsend Harris High School, and when it was time to go to college I went to music school.
  47. Sponberg, Arvid, F. (1991), Broadway talks: what professionals think about commercial theater in America, Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, ISBN 0-313-26687-5, (p. 97) Charles Strouse the composer of By Bye Birdie and Annie, among other musicals, was born in New York City in 1928. He received his education at P.S. 87, Townsend Harris High School, and the Eastman School of Music.{{citation}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  48. "JOSEPH VOGEL, 73, OF M-G-M IS DEAD: PRESIDENT, 1956–63, GUIDED COMPANY IN MONEY CRISIS". The New York Times. March 2, 1969. p. 80.
  49. Brody, Seymour "Sy" (18 July 2008). "Kenneth J. Arrow: Nobel Prize in Economics Recipient". biographic sketch. Florida Atlantic University Libraries. Archived from the original on 1 November 2014. Retrieved 2 January 2011. Arrow was born on August 23, 1921, in New York City. His parents were Jewish and very supportive of his education. He graduated Townsend Harris High School and went to City College of New York ...
  50. Weiss, Samuel (10 June 1985), "THE NEW TOWNSEND HARRIS HIGH KEEPS OLD GOALS", New York Times, retrieved 2 January 2011, In 1942, Mayor Fiorello H. La Guardia ordered the closing of Townsend Harris High School as a nonessential educational unit. In its 36-year existence, the school had won a national reputation, producing such graduates as Dr. Jonas E. Salk, the discoverer of a polio vaccine; Kenneth Arrow, a winner of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Science ...
  51. "The Best Queens Celebirities 2002". list of notable persons from the Borough of Queens. Queens Tribune. 2002. Archived from the original on 1 November 2002. Retrieved 2 January 2011. Eugene Lang - The philanthropist graduated from Townsend Harris High School in 1934.
  52. Levy, Leon; Linden, Eugene (2002), The Mind of Wall Street: A Legendary Financier on the Perils of Greed and the Mysteries of the Market, New York, NY, USA: PublicAffairs (Perseus Books Group), ISBN 1-58648-208-4, ... (pp. x-xi) I might as well 'fess up to some intimate details of my relationship with Leon Levy. Leon and I have known each other since high school and college ... just about all these qualities were visible when we were in Townsend Harris High School together sixty years ago.
  53. Martin, Douglas (8 April 2003), "Leon Levy, Philanthropist, Dies at 77", New York Times, retrieved 2 January 2011, Leon Levy, a hedge fund pioneer ... went on to make many millions, enough to make him one of the main individual backers of archaeological research ... The younger Mr. Levy graduated from Townsend Harris High School in Manhattan in 1939 and from the City College of New York in 1948.
  54. "Paid Notice: Deaths WEISSMAN, GEORGE", New York Times, 29 July 2009, retrieved 2 January 2011, George Weissman attended the famed Townsend Harris High School, located on the City College campus.
  55. Cohen, Felix S.; Wilkins, David Eugene (2006), On the drafting of tribal constitutions, Norman, OK, USA: University of Oklahoma Press, ISBN 0-8061-3806-8, (p. xiv) Felix Cohen was born in New York City ... He attended Towsend Harris High School in New York.
  56. "Education: Sit-Down Strike". Time. Vol. 37, no. 17. 28 April 1941. ISSN 0040-781X. Archived from the original on June 24, 2010. Retrieved 2 January 2011. ... a mob of pupils gathered before Manhattan's Townsend Harris High School ... Object: to protest against Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia's plan to economize by closing their 93-year-old school, alma mater of such celebrities as Mr. Justice Felix Frankfurter, Senator Robert F. Wagner
  57. Moritz, Owen (24 June 1999), "RUDOLPH HALLEY STREAK OF LIGHT", New York Times, retrieved 2 January 2011, UT POLITICAL life did not turn out quite the way Rudolph Halley had hoped. He was a seminal New York story ... The child prodigy graduated elite Townsend Harris High School in Queens at 14
  58. Malcolm, James, ed. (1922). The New York Red Book. Albany, N.Y.: J. B. Lyon Company. p. 121 – via Google Books.
  59. "NIX, Robert Nelson Cornelius, Sr., (1898 - 1987)". biographic sketch. Biographical Directory of the United States Congress. Retrieved 2 January 2011. graduated from Townsend Harris Hall High School, New York, N.Y.
  60. "Robert Nelson Cornelius Nix, Sr.: Representative, 1958–1979, Democrat from Pennsylvania". biographic sketch. Black Americans in Congress: Clerk of the United States House of Representatives. Archived from the original on 5 December 2010. Retrieved 2 January 2011. Nix graduated from Townsend Harris High School in New York City (also attended by Nix's future African-American House colleague Adam Clayton Powell, Jr., of New York) ...
  61. "Igal Roodenko, 74; Led Anti-War Group". New York Times. 1 May 1991. p. D24.
  62. "Assemblywoman Nily Rozic Assembly District 25". assembly.state.ny.us. State of New York. Retrieved 21 October 2014.
  63. "Sol Ullman, Once in Assembly, 48" (PDF). The New York Times. Vol. XC, no. 30480. New York, N.Y. 7 July 1941. p. 15.
  64. "William Zeck, 87, Prosecutor at Nuremberg". The New York Times. November 17, 2002.
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