Jan
and Frederick R. Mayer ’45 have recently made
a generous gift to the Academy that will fund
the first stages of the landscape master plan.
For the Denver-based Mayers, who are enthusiastic
supporters of the visual and performing arts and
major art collectors in their own right, the leap
from canvas to campus was not a difficult one
to make.
“I
went to Exeter a long time ago, when the campus
was teeming with gorgeous trees,” says a reminiscent
Fred. “But those disappeared and the school never
replaced them. Later, as an Academy trustee, I
would sit in this one particular corner of the
Latin study during meetings where I could look
out at the landscape, and it just looked sad.
Of course, I’m competitive enough that when friends
who had attended other New England prep schools
talked about how beautiful their campuses were,
it made me mad because I felt the condition of
our campus was making us look bad.”
Over
the years, Fred’s wife, Jan, who often attended
trustee meetings with him, also developed a strong
interest in and fondness for the Exeter campus,
and she, too, noticed its progressive deterioration.
“We came back at least three times a year during
my trustee years,” says Fred, “during all seasons
of the year. The campus just came to look dreary
to us, like an unmade bed.”
Fred
and Jan, who’d originally made a provision for
Exeter’s campus in their will, decided during
the summer and fall of 2001 that the situation
was in need of a more immediate remedy. Inspired
by the planting of more than 50 trees in the Academic
Quad, Jan and Fred have redirected their resources
toward beautifying the Exeter campus. Coupled
with a gift from a donor who wishes to remain
anonymous, the Mayers gift will allow the first
few phases of the master plan to move forward.
Asked
if there is a connection between his love of art
and his interest in beautifying Exeter’s campus,
Fred says, “I love things that are artistic and
pleasant to look at, and before the initiation
of the landscape master plan, Exeter’s campus
didn’t really fit either of those categories.”
Fred also notes that a painting hanging in the
living room of his Denver home, by 19th century
American artist George Inness, may have influenced
his decision. The painting, entitled “Approaching
Storm,” is of a bucolic landscape. Describing
it, Fred notes, “There are rolling hills and the
leaves on the trees are just beginning to change.
It reminds me of New England, of a scene in Vermont
or New Hampshire. It’s just a gorgeous painting
and one I look at every day when I’m in Denver.
I’m sure subconsciously there’s a connection between
that landscape and Exeter’s.”
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Above:
Jan and Frederick R. Mayer ’45
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Thanks
to Fred and Jan’s foresight and generosity, a
few years down the road, the Exeter campus may
just take on the look of an Inness painting, which
is one return to the past that Fred would welcome.
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