1901-1982. "Born in Baltimore and reared on the Eastern Shore, our 29th headmaster attended... Johns Hopkins, where he was an outstanding football and lacrosse player. Mr. Middleton then headed to Philadelphia to coach the varsity lacrosse team at Penn and teach at Episcopal Academy, where he also coached football and wrestling. He arrived at St. Paul's in 1944 determined to bolster the academic curriculum and win appropriate accreditation.... Mr. Middleton would... institute a grading system and standardized testing... and bring in key faculty members such as Martin Tullai, Thomas Longstreth, Jeanne Shreeve and Michael Rentko." (Crusader Connection, Issue 21, February 2016) — My parents were incompetent to raise me. Mr. Middleton's school was a second chance. He and it failed grossly: My (BMcC[18-11-46-503]) life was wasted by people who were not up to the job and did not seek help to do what they themselves were incapable of and that, not what they did but what they failed to do, was their greatest crime. J'Accuse!
Mr. Middleton was a self-important British "public school" headmaster wannabe. What are real British "public schools"? One disgruntled graduate summed them up: "Fathers ask about the rugby and mothers ask about the buggery."
For many years I focused on Mr. Middleton as the problem, and he was an impediment (my "social adjustment", etc.) but at a distance. Now (+2023.07.13), I see Mr. Mike Rentko as the "poster child", the distilled essence of it all: What he did to me was an empirically determinate act, not just a matter of speculative opinion or declaraions of principles (e.g.: "we want to win varsity lacrosse games"), for or against, mine or anyone else's: just the facts.